


Hero, friend, husband

by Zombieheroine



Series: Names and faces [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Character Study, Dissociation, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Issues, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Physical Disability, Pining, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Drama, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-16
Updated: 2018-08-16
Packaged: 2019-06-28 08:04:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 24,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15703170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zombieheroine/pseuds/Zombieheroine
Summary: The anniversary of Zürich comes about, and two old soldiers visit the graves of the fallen to weigh what has been lost and buried: friends, loves, ideals, the people they used to be.And yet this life still has work for them, and a sudden chance to reach a bit closer towards a reunion presents itself. Two old soldiers seek for the missing third one.





	1. i. Call on a friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Reaper76 Big Bang came this year too, and I took part in it again! I'm very excited to finally share this ficas I wrote it last spring and have sat on it all summer.  
> This is probably the most character oriented thing I've ever written. I loved working on this project.
> 
> This time around I got to work with two amazing artists who illustrated parts of the fic!  
> Bikti and her art [here](http://bikti.tumblr.com/post/177065699393/i-was-paired-up-with-zombieheroine-for-bb-i-tried), and **Spite-or-respite** and her art [here](https://spite-or-respite.tumblr.com/post/177057807278/i-had-the-pleasure-of-working-with-zombieheroine-a)!

The anniversary of Zürich came like it did every year, with minor notifs from the media, trending topics online, and numb grief for certain old soldiers. It had been eleven years since the explosion of the Overwatch headquarters in Zürich, long enough that the event was barely an afterthought, and no names of specific individuals came up. 

The memorial for Overwatch near the UN headquarters in New York was decorated and candles were lit, but it was just a minor event in their calendar, not a media spectacle it had been the first five years after the fall. 

Fallen soldiers were buried in the graveyard like any other, and there was no one left to bring them candles anymore. In the bright early hours of the morning the graveyard somewhere in Virginia was completely vacant. It had been years since the Zürich anniversary had last pulled a crowd there, and even when the soldiers buried there had been remembered on this day, over the years the pilgrimages had shifted to the memorialized ruins in Zürich and statues and memorial plates in the UN headquarters. 

This year the graveyard was completely vacant, save for two figures on a walk. A veiled woman and a man with a white cane were slowly making their way through the morning mist and rows of graves, arms linked and heads down. 

Ana and Jack were making their way through the graveyard depending on memory alone and slowly finding their way to the graves they were looking for. Ana was a step ahead of Jack, leading him as she read some of the tombstones for him and made comments about the particularly interesting ones.

”Oh, these are young ones here, twenty... twenty-four, both of them. Looks like granite stone was fashionable for a while too,” she chatted quietly as they walked down a row. ”I wonder who picked these small stones... Someone's relatives have no taste. Oh, those lanterns built into the tombstones are handy! And very elegant too.” 

Jack's cane traced the stoned edge of the path. Ana's voice was soothing and almost distracted him from the strange grief-laced nostalgia the graveyard brought up. The cold morning air and the damp mist creeped under his clothes and bit his skin and he wanted out of here already, but at the same time he also wished they wouldn't find what they were looking for. Jack had no idea how he'd react when they'd finally get there. 

”Oh, here's a tragic tale,” Ana sighed, ”a whole platoon buried together, privates and sergeants and a lieutenant too. May they be at peace.” 

Jack didn't say anything, but he was grateful for her commentary. It was chilly and the day was already a depressing one, and the firm grip of Ana's hand was the only thing that kept Jack together. He wouldn't even be here without her, this whole thing had been her idea, God only knew why. But whatever her agenda was, Jack had decided to hear her out before brushing her off and going with his plan anyway, if only to be polite. 

”Ah. Here we are,” Ana said, and they stopped. She pat Jack on the arm and pulled him forward a bit. ”Right here, in front of us. Yours is on the left, his to your right.” 

”Thanks,” Jack grunted and let go of Ana's arm. He brought his cane across the path, felt it hit the cornerstones, lifted it on the grass and felt around for the tombstones. He followed his cane, stepped forward, knelt down on the wet grass and reached for the stones with his hand. He still recalled what his tombstone looked like and he didn't really think anything of it, but somehow he dreaded to reach to the right so he took a look at the grave in any case. He felt the engraved name and the date as well as the obituary that had been later added by his relatives. 

He scoffed out loud. ”Hero, friend, husband,” he read out loud, ”who came up with this garbage?”

”Someone who wanted you to be remembered as who you really were, not just as a commander,” Ana supplied. 

Jack scoffed. ”They should have picked something else.”

Ana didn't argue with him, and so he let the subject be dropped. The grave might have been empty, but Jack Morrison had died on the date on the stone anyway. No argument and no more text also meant that he was running out of excuses to stall, and so he had to shift a bit and bring himself to reach his hand to the right. 

There was a thin patch of slippery grass, but clearly in the same spot was another stone. It was just as modest and up to regulations as Jack's, but above the engraved name and the date of death was a carving of a long-faced skull carried by feathery wings. Jack traced the death's head with his fingertips and felt a dull pang of pain in his heart.

”He did get his wish, huh,” he said.

Ana laughed softly. ”It was in his death plan, you don't argue with that. But you knew that.”

Jack made an agreeing noise. He had been there writing that plan, and he had written a plan of his own too. ”Yeah. And the quote - ” he searched the stone for a moment before finding the text, then traced the letters. ”In death we are all equal,” he read. It made him feel almost fond. ”He was charmingly morbid sometimes.” 

”I recall,” Ana replied. 

They stood there in silence for a long moment. Tension lingered between them, but neither addressed it by name.

Instead, Jack turned back to his own tombstone and gave it a pat. ”Well... Maybe they got a point. I'm just a soldier now after all. All of these things have been buried here. Hm.” He huffed at the end of his sentence, like an additional mark of finality in a declaration. His hand stroked the smooth stone. 

”In a manner of speaking, perhaps,” Ana admitted. ”You're pretty lively for a dead man, though.” 

Jack huffed again, this time with some amusement. ”Aren't we both?” A pause. ”You could have told me sooner, you know.” 

Ana shrugged and took a deep breath. She knew it wasn't an accusation, but it stung a bit regardless. ”Are you really the one to tell me that, Jack?” 

Jack's shoulders slumped a bit and he was quiet. He took a deep breath and gave a sigh, his fingers tracing his own obituary again. ”I hear you,” he said then. ”I just... Hm. It’s strange, this whole situation. But I do know that as I am now I’m as good as dead for those who called me by these names. And also that I have no right to ask for forgiveness.” 

Rationally Ana knew Jack was just speaking the fair and honest truth, and she recognized her own situation to be the same, but even though she wasn't one to argue with truth no matter how uncomfortable, his apathetic tone called forth her gentler side. She watched him trace the words on the tombstone for a moment longer before speaking up.

”Jack,” she called him like a summoner, ”you are still my friend. And I trust that I am yours.” 

Speaking his name made Jack perk up in some way that was familiar, and finally he stood up from the cold ground. He gave Ana a slightly strained smile and a nod, stepping from the grass to the path again. ”Of course you are. Thanks.” 

”Anytime,” Ana quipped and reached for Jack's elbow again. 

They took an overnight flight back to Europe. Their eventual destination, Necropolis where they had set up camp semi-permanently for a time being. The plane was seated only about half full and Ana and Jack got a row of their own. Jack had the window seat and Ana sat next to him, one empty seat separating them from the corridor. They were huddled there near the back of the plane, and after Ana had convinced the overtly caring flight attendant that they didn't need anything, they were left alone. 

The flight was a smooth one with the lights on the plane were dimmed down. Most of the passengers were asleep, a few had a screen in front of them and headphones on, and after screening her surroundings Ana came to the conclusion that they were secure. 

There was nothing to see outside of the window, nor did Jack have eyes to really look, but still he was leaning his head on the frame and had his face towards the darkness. He thought about the ocean somewhere far below, deep and dark. 

Ana rested her elbow on the armrest between them and regarded her friend.

”It's back to work then, huh,” she muttered conversationally. 

Jack grunted something and curled up tighter in the corner of his seat. ”Yeah.” 

Ana stared into the blackness of the window too, but from the corner of her eye watched Jack as well. ”You know, we could throw out a larger net,” Ana said, ”we could look into some previous contacts and funders. I have a good memory, and if all that time in intel taught me anything, it's to follow the money.” 

”I don't care about the money trails, and he doesn't either,” Jack answered. 

Ana felt a knot in her chest, the same that she knew was squeezing Jack’s too judging by his strained tone. ”I know,” she said, ”but we also know he's an associate. And everything we can learn from Talon could prove to be useful. He might not care, but all we need is to get on his tracks.” 

Jack sighed. ”You're right there alright.” 

Ana was pleased with the response, but didn't let the subject drop even though it was heavy on her too. She measured Jack up quickly before continuing: ”I also think that we need to consider that we do not know our target as well as we previously liked to think.” 

Jack murmured something unintelligible and clicked his tongue. ”You don't have to tell me that.” 

Ana kept a respectful pause and hoped it communicated her sympathies. ”I know, and I don't need to tell it to myself either,” she said, ”but it's a thought that I think both of us would be comfortable to forget.”

Jack sighed and turned towards her. He looked a bit irritated, but a clearly more prominent note was exhaustion. He took his sunglasses off, and Ana watched as his clouded pupils fought in vain to focus. 

”I was comfortable with forgetting it,” Jack said. ”I don’t let myself do that anymore.”

Ana gave his arm a pat. “You just couldn’t see it back then, what he was becoming,” she quietly said. “I know better than most. I was exactly the same. I just saw my old friend, and I couldn’t accept what he was turning into.”

There was an uncomfortable wrinkle between Jack’s eyes and he looked pained even when he nodded. “That’s not even it. I could see it, I just… I trusted him. I trusted him to know where the line was. And I believed in him, even when I saw what he was doing right before my own eyes.”

Arguing would have been dishonest and Ana didn't have that in her, so she let it be. “And that is precisely why we’ll get back to work now. To face that and even old scores. What else would old soldiers fight for?”

Jack huffed softly, in an almost amused manner. Having work to do was like a lifeline for him, and every time he got to cling on it he was visibly relieved. “Old soldiers looking Reaper in the eye. That's almost poetic,” he mused. 

It was a grim joke, but still it made Ana snicker lightly. “Indeed. The humour doesn't escape me either. But I can't help but wonder, what does he see when he looks back.” 

Jack gave a deep sigh. “I don't know. What is there to see anymore? There's not much left, let alone to recognize. He might not even care. Perhaps he has forgotten already, maybe he never cared.” Jack tried to fake flippancy as he speculated, but he wasn't fooling anyone, least of all Ana, and probably not even himself. He sounded bitter. 

“Truth is always scary, especially when it's yet to be discovered. We shouldn't... We shouldn't guess too much,” Ana replied. “But... Well, I don't know what's left of me either, Jack. I know who I was and what I was to others, but now... I must confess I'm very much lost. I’ve had my private mission and my mask these past years, but you summoned me back.” 

They were in contemplating silence for a moment. It was comfortable like that, like a safe breathing break from the heavy issue at hand. The dimly lit plane itself was a liminal space just like their silence, something that allowed them to pretend that they were going nowhere and that they didn't exist. 

“It's to strange when you call me that,” Jack said then. 

Ana didn't understand right away. “Call you what?” 

“When you call me Jack,” Jack specified. He sounded curious, like he was inspecting his own name and wondering what power it held. “I haven't been called by my name in years. I haven't even thought about it as my name in a long while. It's strange that I react to it.” 

“Huh,” Ana said. It was a curious notion, something that she hadn't really thought about but still found that she related to as well. It wasn't like she had been anything except the faceless Shrike just like Jack was Soldier 76, but losing something like one's own name was still an alien notion. “Well, I shall continue to use it and remind you of it. Because you are Jack, and Jack is my friend.” 

Her words brought a smile on Jack's face. 

It was morning when they landed, and they continued their journey right away. They picked up their light luggage and walked out of the airport with their arms linked but with a casual amount of space between them. It was a part of their image that helped them blend in, a disguise of a mellow old couple or perhaps a disabled man and his personal assistant, and they pulled it off with practiced ease. Not that they necessarily had to work for blending in since Jack's perfectly explainable sunglasses and Ana's eye-patch already gave them a layer of disguise as they were, and Jack's white cane made staring at them rude. No one wanted to stare a blind man in the face for too long, let alone a blind man with scars in that face, but it never hurt to be discreet. 

They used public transport as much as possible and crossed the more inconvenient distances by a taxi, but in order to get back to their base without any possibility of detection or without raising suspicion, they had to walk. It was dark again when they arrived at Necropolis and slipped inside the ruins.

Home sweet home. For the sake of efficiency they did their rounds separately, and for that Jack wore his visor. They checked all the trap wires and the surveillance systems they had set up to secure the base, and all of them came out clean, and finally they met up in the inner sanctum where most of their equipment was set up. 

“All clear,” Ana reported and sat down in front of their computer system. 

“Likewise,” Jack answered and joined her. He peered at the screen over her shoulder as Ana browsed through their information feeds pinning and filing away the interesting bits. Not that there were much, only brief news reports and short articles, some think pieces with no new information, and no new sightings. 

“Well, that's not unexpected,” Jack said, clearly thinking along the same lines. “He's always been very discreet when he wants to be. We have no reason to expect Reaper to just waltz about in broad daylight every second Tuesday.”

“Truly,” Ana remarked drily. “Well-educated criminals have always been a nuisance. Not that Talon needed Blackwatch’s playbook for that.”

“Point,” Jack said.

They were stalling. The conversation was useless chit-chat of pointing out the obvious in order to avoid the painful main topic. Reaper was officially their top priority and only target, but they both were far too comfortable to regard him from the corner of their eye than fix their gazes on him. It was closer to a year since the day they had been reunited with Reaper in Egypt and gotten confirmation of his former identity, and even though both admitted that something had to be done about it neither had the strength to really focus on it. It was unclear who was more uncomfortable with the situation, who was more in pain. 

Ana brought up the digital file of their research and opened the timeline they had built. They had been through it time after time, both together and on their own, but nothing akin to a pattern stood out. It was random, the activity had large gaps in it, and only some incidents were clearly Talon missions, some others seemed to lack all sorts of purpose. It was the occasional and messy handwork of a mercenary. 

“He must want something,” Ana muttered. “He was there in Egypt specifically for us, it was too convenient to be a coincidence. He must have come to meet us. Which means that we still have a connection.” 

“I wouldn’t count on that,” Jack answered. “There are many kinds of connections, and I for one wouldn’t exactly jump from joy about being someone’s target.”

Ana felt a tug of pity in her heartstrings. She knew Jack too well to think that his bitter anger was just that and not a cover for a deeper hurt underneath it. She had noticed how Jack sometimes idly rubbed his bare left ring finger with his thumb when he was sitting alone and thinking with his forehead in creases. But Ana also knew Jack well enough to keep that pity to herself, and the decision to do so was even accompanied by something like jealousy; because after all, Reaper had been her friend too. She had loved him too. 

“Obviously,” Ana said, bypassing all the feelings she couldn’t express, “but this is an important part of our job. We might all have graves somewhere out there, but we didn’t bury everything we were. That affects the current situation, and you know it too.” 

Jack was silent in a mellow, thoughtful way. It was a sign that he had really listened and heard, and was possibly even re-evaluating the situation with this new information. He didn’t say anything for another minute, and Ana browsed through the timeline again. 

Eventually Jack tired of the investigation and reached for his visor. He pushed the fastening mechanisms along the surface and undid them with ease, and the red light of the visor went dark as the links to the implants in his skull disconnected. He lowered the mask and rubbed at the lines it had left on his face.

Ana watched him via the screen. The red glare of the visor was always sharp, but the man underneath it was tired. 

“I think I’ll call it a day,” he said. “I’m too tired to get anything done, besides I think we both have done enough for the day. I’ll go to bed now, if that’s alright with you.”

“Of course. I’ll go too, there’s nothing new for me to analyse here anyway.”

Jack nodded. “There will be more eventually, I’m afraid. If I ever knew anything about him it’s that he’s no quitter.” 

“You don’t have to tell me that,” Ana chuckled. 

Jack huffed as he turned to leave, almost returning the chuckle but not quite. Perhaps it was too hard for him to get any amusement out of the situation, or he was simply too tired for it. Ana didn’t press, nor did she bother Jack about sleeping in that lonely camp bed he had set up for himself in one corner. 

Right before he left, Jack seemed to think about something that made him stop on the doorway. He hesitated for a second, then turned to say: “You know… Burying us isn’t the problem. Being dead isn’t the problem. It’s that he changed so much.”

 _Would you prefer he was dead for real?_ Ana didn’t ask. She didn’t say anything, and Jack didn’t seem to expect her to. He walked out of the sanctum and that was it. 

The following week was as uneventful as the first day back. It was filled with surveillance and intel sweeps through news sites and via some contacts they had managed to gather during their years as rogues, but nothing came up. Their days were filled with combing through information and filing it, but as nothing of great import was added to their files, instead of work they passed the time by arranging things in the temple, doing some minor chores, and trying to talk to each other. 

In general Ana and Jack were on good terms, and despite their years apart and the old pain of loss they still had years and years of steadfast, comfortable friendship to fall back on. But talking to each other was still hard. It wasn’t anything personal about one another, it was more about how either of them hadn’t talked to anyone in a long while. 

By the end of the week something unusual finally happened, but not in the form of a Talon attack or a Reaper sighting, but as a message that came through in the old Overwatch emergency frequency. The very same the Recall had been sent, but this time it was addressed more specifically. 

“Commander, Captain, come in, please. Commander, Captain, come in, please.”

The voice over the broadcast was a familiar cheery speech of a young woman, so unchanged and so clearly part of another life it was like that someone was calling them through time. 

“Commander, Captain, come in. Four-Four, seven-seven, seven-seven-seven, seven, eight.” 

The message played over three times, and then the frequency went quiet. They presumed the message would play again after a period of time, maybe on the next whole hour, but until then there was only the faint rattling of a dead radio frequency. 

Ana switched the transmitter off and turned to Jack, whose blind eyes were staring ahead, his brows up and his mouth in a tight line. 

“They want us to come in,” Ana said. 

“Yes, I got that much,” Jack replied, coming to life and starting to pace around. His hand rubbed his stubbly chin as he did so, an old habit that displayed itself when he was deep in thought. 

“I’ve checked satellite images of each old HQ site,” Ana said. “Some crates have changed places in the yard of the Gibraltar HQ, so I believe that’s the base they have chosen. How many and who have actually taken refuge there, I do not know. But they are calling on us.”

Jack grunted something unintelligible and kept pacing. His surprise had turned into a grim expression that Ana wore as well, but Jack had more irritation in his. “Winston launched the Recall, so my money’s on at least Oxton having answered. Perhaps… Perhaps some other young ones… Mccree, Shimada, maybe even Ziegler… Maybe Reinhardt too. But no one’s guaranteed…” 

Ana huffed and rolled her eyes with a tilted smile. “Oh, I agree with you there… The young and the enthusiastic have most likely stepped forth. But I have to say, Angela was always very reserved about serving with us even when we had the UN backing us, and Mccree and Shimada left our ranks on their own accord. I don’t think we should assume anything of anyone.” 

Jack hummed in thought and rubbed his cheek roughly. “It doesn’t matter who’s there. I don’t want to see any one of them. Besides, they are breaking the law, those brats are ruining their own lives fooling around like that.” 

With that Ana could only agree, even if she would have phrased it differently. “But why are they calling us in? Specifically us?” she wondered. 

“Who knows,” Jack huffed, indifferent. He searched for the other office chair, and when he found it he pulled it next to Ana’s and slumped down on it. “But you don’t call a babysitter for yourself, and I highly doubt anyone would call us in for our experience and expertise.”

Ana almost laughed at that. “Yes, if training recruitments was hard, I can’t even imagine what it would be like trying to train a herd of rogue operatives! I always said Reyes was insane taking those under his wing.” There was a moment of cold strain in the room between them after she mentioned Reaper by his name, and she bit her tongue. The icy silence lasted for a couple of seconds, and then with a deep breath they both moved on from it. 

“Yes, well. It was what it was,” Jack muttered. “And that’s not a job I’d take, not back then, and not now. Not that I believe that’s what we’re offered here… But now that you mentioned… Perhaps… Perhaps this is relevant to our interests as well.” He spoke slowly and carefully, almost like he was checking himself over and over for useless hope. 

But now that the thought had been said aloud, Ana saw the possibility too. They were called in together, and even though the recalled agents couldn’t know that they were together, they did know about the few things that connected them. Mainly, the mistakes of the past. 

“Well it must be related to Talon. Talon’s been on the move, no one could have missed Akande’s escape from prison, nor the assassination of Mondatta, nor the strike to Volskaya Industries. We have a common enemy, one we all know by name and recognize by their handiwork,” Ana listed seriously, then paused. “But… I don’t think they know who Reaper really is,” she added. She avoided naming Reaper this time, but just bringing him up was enough to make her shift awkwardly.

Jack looked even grimmer now and he was chewing on the insides of his cheeks as he thought. “No, they probably don’t, and I’d like to keep it that way. I already can’t stand Mccree, and I don’t want him mixed into this as well. He’d take it personally.” 

Ana sympathized with Jack and she had to admit that she didn’t want any more people mixed into their personal business either, but Jack’s statement still didn’t sit entirely right with her. She thought well of Mccree, the young rascal she had known and partially raised and trained as well, and she knew how important and formative Jesse’s years with them had been. “You shouldn’t be so harsh about Jesse,” Ana said. “He was important to Jesse too. He was a mentor to him. I’m sure Jesse would like to know.” 

Jack gave a deep, suffering sigh. “No, he wouldn’t _like_ it. Just because he had dinner at my house weekly doesn’t mean I owe him this. Besides, don’t you think he’ll take us coming back from the dead hard enough?” 

That was a thing Ana had avoided thinking of, the hurt she had caused for those closest to her when she had failed to return from her last mission. It pained her to think about those young ones she had let down. “Unfortunately, I think this will be hard for everyone,” she said, “yet it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it.”

Jack raised a brow at her. “You really consider going there to be evaluated by our bratty juniors?”

If Jack could have seen it, Ana would have given him one of her piercing looks that told the other to think about their words carefully. “I don’t think I’m the one who fears the judgement of others, Jack.” 

Jack’s lips squeezed into a pale line. He laced his fingers together in his lap and squeezed. His jaw moved like he was grinding his teeth together, and when he finally formed words, his voice had that bitter tone too common nowadays: “I should have known… When Mccree left.” 

Ana frowned and had to think back. The moments when Jesse had actually left them, when they had received the information about it, and when they realized he wasn’t coming back were months apart from each other. 

Jack was grinding his teeth again. “He knew something had changed after that incident in Venice. He knew and he turned his back to it, but I just cleared my old brother in arms for duty.” 

“And I supported you,” Ana reminded him. 

Jack combed his fingers harshly through his thinning hair, almost pulling at it. He shook his head. “He was changing right there, before my very own eyes, and I just let him. I thought he’d know when to stop.” 

“We both did,” Ana reminded him again, firmer this time. 

Her tone made Jack sigh and his shoulders slump. He combed his fingers through his hair again, leaving some of the grey strands sticking up from the back. “Damn,” he said to nothing in particular. Then he straightened up again. “Do you think we should go in, then?” 

“Chances are that they have something on Talon that we don’t. And if it’s something that we don’t agree with, or something irrelevant, we could always simply leave. It doesn’t hurt to look,” Ana concluded. 

Jack thought about it for a moment, then nodded. “That’s it, then. Let’s go and report in. I’ll pack my things and set up the trap wires on the west side of the temple. Should we leave tomorrow already?”

“Sure, why wouldn’t we? It’s not like we are busy here. I’ll clear the east side and cover up the equipment.” 

Jack got up to leave right away, but after just a few steps he stopped and lingered. He clearly had something to say, but that something made him awkward and he shuffled his feet and picked on his nails instead of opening his mouth. 

Ana waited, as endlessly patient with Jack’s moods as she was with their shared awkward slips. 

“You shouldn’t call him Reyes anymore,” Jack finally said. “Reyes is dead. That thing we’re hunting is not him.” 

With that he left, walking the cool corridors of Necropolis with his hand tracing the walls to keep him on his path.


	2. ii.i Summon a hero

Jack hadn’t been happy about the recall, and he certainly wasn’t happy about answering it, no matter how freelance or unofficial or on his on terms it was happenings. Overwatch was something that had failed and been left behind, and that was how in Jack’s opinion it should have stayed. The fall had been a painful process of corrosion, one thing after another that went wrong and eventually piled up until the entire thing collapsed like a cancer-ridden body, and things that had been once buried should have stayed like that. Jack would have been content to just dig up the truth about it, to clear the name of his life’s work as much as possible, and bringing it back from the grave wasn’t a part of that plan.

Nevertheless, he agreed with Ana, and in hopes of gaining new knowledge that would help them with their quest for answers and ghosts, they started on their journey to Gibraltar. Compared to their latest trip to America the trip from Egypt to Gibraltar was laughably short, a one-day trip with barely any tedious parts in it, like that painful ten-hour flight Jack could have definitely done without. He had always liked travelling within Europe and northern Africa as the region was well-connected and distances were short, and this time he and Ana travelled with ease. 

But despite the familiar paths, Jack didn’t feel at ease, not really. Naturally he couldn’t wear Soldier’s visor on public transport, but he longed for it. It was like another face, something steely and new to cover the scarred and wrinkled remains of a man. The visor was packed in his duffel in a case for a visual aid, a regulation-issued casing with forged description papers from a doctor, all that was needed to travel with it. Not that anyone asked about it, Jack always chose low-risk means of travel, places and agencies that didn’t pay too much attention to their customers and allowed the maximum level of self-service. Those suited Jack nowadays well. The less he had to be in contact with others, the better. 

The visor was packed away, but he could still feel it through the duffel, and again and again he felt for the hard edges of the casing to make sure it was still there, to be sure that if needed, he could just pull it out and put it on. It was a comfort of sorts, and every time he felt it, it momentarily eased his anxiety about meeting his former underlings. He didn’t want to show his face to any of them, and he couldn’t even begin to count the reasons. 

Ana was equally quiet and somewhat anxious too, Jack could sense it. When they boarded a ferry to cross the narrow sea to Europe, they settled on its deck and watched the sea in heavy silence. Jack enjoyed the rocking of the ferry, the smell of salt and the wind on his face, and he imagined the distant shoreline of Europe ahead. It was too close for his liking, and he wished the way would be longer so that he’d have more time to gather himself, and the closed-up silence of his friend by his side told of similar feelings.

“What do you think, how’s it gonna be?” Jack asked when the silence finally burdened him too much. 

“Mm. I don’t know,” Ana muttered back. She was leaning on the railing with her arms tugged close to her body. Her scarf fluttered in the sea wind. “It depends so much on who’s going to be there.”

Jack already knew this, but still he felt an anxious twist in his stomach. “Do you think that… They’ll be happy to see us?” It wasn’t quite what he was anxious about, but it was the closest he could get in verbalizing it. There was too much murky, vaguely negative emotion blend churning in his gut to name individual parts of it, and Jack had never been particularly good at that anyway. 

Ana shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe they won’t even care,” she said. “Who’s to say what former officers like us even mean to anyone?” 

This time it was she who sounded more bitter, it was clear in the way her words stretched and her voice creaked. Her fingers tangled in her scarf like she couldn’t stop brushing and adjusting it, even if the wind was tugging at it rather gently and neatly towards her back. 

“What worries you?” Jack asked. 

Ana sighed deeply and didn’t answer right away. The question was heavy, and for a moment she just shuffled her feet and drummed the railing with her fingers. “Don’t think you’re the only one who let people down,” she said then. 

“I don’t,” Jack replied even though she didn’t need his reassurances. 

She paid him no mind. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed how precious that visor is to you either.”

“Yes, well, I need it to see,” Jack said drily, attempting a little joke, “a blind soldier is pretty much useless, even with a targeting system.”

Ana huffed and didn’t take the chance to bypass the issue with a disposable joke. “It’s not just the ability or how it helps you, Jack. I’ve seen you put it on and turn into Soldier. You stand up straighter, you talk more firmly, and you act more swiftly. That visor is so much more than just visual aid for you, or means to an end.”

Jack didn’t have a reply to that. He felt uncomfortable, exposed in some way, almost as if he was being called out on an embarrassing habit or a clear weakness. He turned his face against the wind and listened to the waves crashing against the side of the ferry. For once he was glad he didn’t have to decide where to look. 

“It’s not a bad thing per se,” Ana continued, “but that’s what it is, maybe that’s how it has to be. And God knows this life has tested us and so we need these things to keep on living it. But my point is, I failed too. I used to be someone else, and I took great pride in that someone.” Her voice was sill creaky with bitterness, but now it had gained another tone too, something almost like wistfulness when she recalled old times. “I used to be so proud of what I was. I was a self-made woman, a part of the elite. Captain Amari, one of the greatest snipers to ever live. I watched over my team like a guardian angel from my watchpoint, and I saved lives. “She chuckled. “Maybe it was vanity, maybe it was useless and overtly idealistic, but I quite liked that about myself back then. Until…Well, you know what happened. Until I couldn’t take that shot, and after that I couldn’t be that person anymore.” 

Jack knew and remembered the incident very well, and he still hadn’t quite gotten over the hurt losing Ana like that had caused him then. It had ached like something awful, for a moment it had felt like he was going to die too, and now years later he had learned that that pain had been for nothing. Not that Jack had any right to throw any sort of a tantrum over that, he knew all too well what it was like to be unable to come back. It wasn’t that your feet couldn’t carry you, it was something deeper. Maybe the Captain Amari who was the proud, confident guardian had indeed died back then, and this Ana was someone different. In any case, Jack knew what it was about and didn’t argue it. 

“But Jack, I was also so much more than that, and when I failed to come back I lost it all,” Ana continued, and now the bitter edge had faded, watered down by the memories or regret. “I was also a mother. Someone called me ‘Mom’. But I abandoned her too and lost all right to be called that. And even though you know what it’s like to lose someone you love, you are not a parent, and that pain is mine alone.” 

Jack didn’t have anything to say to that. She was right, and that was that. They listened to the heavy waves and the screams of the seagulls above. 

“So you’re afraid that Fareeha is going to be there,” Jack concluded after a minute. 

“If anyone’s told her that they are trying to summon me, yes. I did send that letter I wrote. I think she even got it. But I don’t know which is worse, if she is there, or if she’s been called but that she doesn’t want to see me,” Ana said. 

She was right. Jack couldn’t even being to imagine any of that, so he remained quiet, and the subject was dropped. It wasn’t like there was much to add. 

But children remained as a sort of a proxy topic. Deep in thought Jack reached once again for his duffel and the casing of the visor, but Ana’s comments came to mind in the mid of the movement and he stopped himself. That didn’t escape Ana either, and he heard her chuckle.

“I didn’t tell you to stop from fumbling for that thing,” she said, laughter in her voice. “Go ahead, if it makes you feel better.” 

Jack squeezed his hand into a fist instead. “I’d rather not draw too much attention to it.” 

“Oh, trust me, you’re not,” Ana reassured him with amusement, “it’s just that I have known you for over three decades. One learns things about another human being in such time. And some of it is peculiar.” 

“Peculiar,” Jack repeated, not sure how to feel about it. He had always considered himself a rather mundane person, an ordinary man who appreciated simple things. ‘Peculiar’ wasn’t something that was thrown in his way often. 

Ana laughed, quiet and warm. “Well, if it means anything to you, I really do think it’s the army life that made us the way we are. Especially today. We both saw the Omnic Crisis from the field, and we both made the army our career. A lot of people have a specific personality for their job, and Overwatch agent wasn’t like any other job in the world.” 

No argument to be made there. Jack remembered the pressure, the expectation and the scrutiny focused on them all too well. He sometimes wondered if he had gone grey in his late forties solely because of the additional stress. And Ana was right about more than just that. 

“Do you remember when Mccree came to dinner for the first time?” he asked.

Ana laughed. “I do! I really do, oh, it was funny.”

“He really thought that I was two different people.” Jack smiled at the memory too. “Maybe you are onto something, I really couldn’t be Strike-Commander at home.” 

The memory was bittersweet, so much so that he could almost taste it. It made his brow furrow and his eyes brim with water like at the taste of sour candy, but still there was a sweet undercurrent to it. It was also dangerously close to the things he avoided nowadays, things he didn’t talk about or even allow himself to think about, because if he let himself sink into those memories their sweetness would eventually win over, and then he wouldn’t sleep, eat or function. Those memories formed the softest, sweetest swamp that took him, and the deeper he sunk the harder it was to struggle out of it. One memory was enough to lure him in.

Those memories were of days past and everything he used to have then, and now that it was all gone and he was alone, the memories had received a golden hue and a tint of washed out pastels, like beautiful pictures collected into a child’s scrapbook with thick white pages. Bringing up that one afternoon when Mccree had joined Jack and his husband for dinner for the first time of the many to come was one such memory, a silly, exciting afternoon in their shared home. 

Commander Reyes had been a stern, capable officer who ran Blackwatch independent and tight, but if it had been the Commander who had taken the young agent under his wing, it had been Gabe who had brought him into his home. Because it was Gabe who walked under the rose arch of the park on the Zürich Headquarter’s grounds and entered the realm of homes for the staff and the soldiers, and it was Gabe who never failed to greet him with “honey, I’m home” when he stepped through the front door. Even now if Jack closed his eyes and blocked away the swirling mist and shadows in his vision he could summon back that image, Gabe coming home after work and giving him a warm smile. In the memory Jack could see the spark in those deep brown eyes and the wrinkles around them when Gabe gave him that look that only the two of them shared, private and affectionate.

Suddenly Jack jerked and shook himself awake from the memory. He shook his head and wrapped his arms around himself as he forced himself to pull away from the memory and banish it back into the dark corners of his mind. 

It was painful to let go of that image, and with his right hand he rubbed his left arm like trying to soothe himself. He took a few deep breaths and opened his eyes again, managed to spot the line of the horizon and concentrated on that. He returned into the present and into his current self, but a distant throbbing pain in his chest remained. 

“It’s just a memory, it can’t hurt you,” Ana said from his side. She had apparently spotted his little moment of drifting and offered her acknowledgement and comfort even without knowing what had pulled Jack under. She was wrong about the hurting part, but Jack nodded his thanks anyway. 

Arrival at Gibraltar was strange. 

Jack recognized the place by smells and sounds alone even though he hadn’t really paid much mind to them when he had previously been there. Yet they were the same, the constant sound and smell of the sea, the market place with fresh catch and spices, some local food sizzling in a large pan and smelling incredible even though he couldn’t tell what it was. The streets felt the same under his feet, and even the noise from traffic and people somehow felt specific to this place. 

But they weren’t here for sight-seeing but for business, and their real destination was the little peak off the shore where the former Overwatch base was built. It was one of the minor faculties they had had, but even the minor ones were large on some standards, and the Gibraltar base was located in a highly tactical place between Europe and Africa. It had always been well-staffed, roomy and especially technology-wise well-equipped. 

Jack and Ana wandered the city, stopped for lunch at a restaurant and waited for the right time. The evening was short, and when the sun started to set they gathered their stuff and headed up the mountain. The walk there was a long one, and since the base was technically out of use and closed for the public they couldn’t use the tunnels but had to go around, and by the time they finally found the chain link fence separating them from the base it was dark. They threw their bags over the fence before climbing it themselves, very easily since someone had gotten rid of the barbed wire that had previously been a part of the practical safety measures. Someone else had gotten used to climbing these fences too, apparently. 

Once they were standing on the base ground, Jack reached into his duffel and pulled out his cane that he had packed away for the climb. It was folded once from the middle, and he straightened it and took it to use before picking up his bag. Ana was waiting for him and presumably scanning the premises. For Jack it was pitch black so he didn’t know how much light Ana had to use, but maybe just the stars or distant lights helped her enough. 

“Ready?” Ana asked.

“Yes.” 

Neither one of them were, but they moved anyway. They circled the large rocks and stepped into the familiar yard that had also been a landing site for incoming shuttles, and as they walked Jack mentally measured the place up. It felt somehow smaller than he remembered. 

“Oh, the lighthouse is so beautiful,” Ana said. “In your eleven o’clock.” 

Jack turned to that direction and waited, and indeed he could see a moving smear of light in the darkness, apparently the light of the lighthouse. Having grown up inland the sea shore had been a somewhat exotic place for Jack, and the lighthouse had been like straight out of a post card. It was comforting to know that it was still there. 

“Where do you think everybody is?” Jack asked.

“I don’t know, but it’s not like it’s a big base. Let’s try the command tower first, and if everything’s empty, then try the living quarters.” 

“If they are doing the surveillance right, they should know we’re already here,” Jack grunted. 

“Maybe they want to play hide and seek,” Ana chuckled. 

The base was very quiet. No lights on anywhere, no surveillance, no movement. Ana pointed out that the transmission tower had its blinking red light on, but that could have been just for the sake of air traffic with nothing to do with the presumed manning of the base itself. 

They walked across the landing site, and Ana looked around, searching for signs of life anywhere. None was to be seen, and they circled the large rock formations for the side door. It wasn’t open, but the locking system was active when they tried. 

“Definitely active,” Ana said. “But it’s not like these things are left completely without power even when abandoned. Should we try our entry codes?” 

“And give away our identities? Why don’t you try just to request access? If we’re waited, they’ll let us in.” 

Ana did just that, and then they waited. There was a sort of electric charge in the air as they waited, both anxious and excited, both of them instinctually preparing for any possibility there was. 

The small screen above the keypad flashed green: _Access granted_. 

The heavy metal door whirred and clicked as its internal mechanisms worked, and finally it opened. Ana went in first, and after measuring the step with his cane Jack followed her. 

It was cool and quiet inside the mountain, and Jack could feel the empty space around him arching high above. He had expected the place to smell like dust, but funnily enough it didn’t. There were smells of metal, rubber, motor oil, and an underlining odour of something that reminded Jack of kennels. 

“Yep, we are definitely in a manned base,” Ana said as they walked in. “Winston’s definitely redecorated, although I wouldn’t have objected to a tire swing when I worked here either.” 

“I doubt that would have passed the workplace safety requirements,” Jack said. “What else?” 

“Crates, most of them pretty old. No other labels besides Overwatch on them. A rather impressing computer system set up up there by what I can tell from here. And some sort of a mech I haven’t seen before.” 

“Any signs of life?”

Someone else answered instead of Ana, a serene female voice over a loudspeaker somewhere: “Welcome back, Commander, Captain. Would you prefer to be addressed by your respective ranks, simply your names, or the new identities you have adapted?” 

“Well hello there, Athena,” Ana greeted in surprise, then lowered her voice to address Jack: “What do you say? How shall we go?”

Jack had jumped at the sudden new presence in the space, and that surprise had settled into awkwardness about the question. There was nothing that justified a claim on his old rank, but his last name felt equally foreign. It was somehow connected to the rank and without it rang even emptier than his first name, and a request to solve this identity crisis right this second had caught him off guard. “I’m just a soldier,” he managed to mutter. 

“Very well. Welcome, Soldier 76,” Athena’s neutral voice replied, offering no challenge or wonder. 

“Well, there’s hardly any need for my rank either,” Ana said. “Just Ana will do, Athena. We’re familiar enough, aren’t we?” 

“We are indeed. Thank you, and welcome, Ana,” Athena said. “I have notified Winston of your arrival, and according to the surveillance he along with agent Oxton is making his way here as we speak.” 

A new sense of discomfort settled over Jack. All of this was expected, but still it made him uncomfortable. He didn’t want to see his old agents. He didn’t want to meet them, let them look at him or hear what they had to say. He didn’t know why, or what he exactly feared they would do, but the discomfort was there none the less. 

Ana moved to stand by his side. “Well at least we are in the right place and don’t have to wait forever,” she commented. “Children these days... You can never expect too little, but at least they have the sense to come and receive people they have summoned.” 

“We managed to knock some manners in them then,” Jack muttered in return, making Ana chuckle. 

The main door chirred and clunked when it was opened, and two very different figures appeared from the small tunnel and the low stairs, one large on all fours and one petite that dashed through the air in sudden flashes of light.

Winston was just as big as he had always been, and still as awkward as he approached them trying to appear confident despite his shyness. “Hello,” he quipped quickly, “ah, I see you found your way here faster than I had anticipated. And our message reached you both, as planned.”

The sound of Lena’s blink located her right in front of them, and Jack couldn’t quite keep from startling back. 

“Hi!” Lena greeted with overflowing joy, “we were so afraid you wouldn’t come at all! Welcome, welcome! Oh, Captain Amari, is it really you?! I missed you so much, I can hardly believe it’s really you! How are you, ma’am?” 

Ana laughed at Lena’s almost tearful flood of greetings and questions. “Yes, it’s really me, child. I’m terribly sorry for leaving you all like I did, but in any case, here I am. It’s wonderful to see you too.”

Winston reached them finally too and joined the conversation. “Apologizes won’t be necessary,” he assured her, “we are simply glad you are here now. Thanks to your daughter we knew to look for you, and whatever made you make the decision that you did is a thing of the past.”

The air around Ana shifted, and Jack sensed her tensing up at the mention of Fareeha. “Ah, yes, I did reach out to her. Is she… Is she here?” Her voice was strictly calm and her tone feigned neutrality, but it was too rigid to be genuine, and Jack knew better anyway. s

Winston and Lena noticed nothing, however. 

“No, Fareeha never enlisted and the recall went out to agents only. But she kept in touch with Mccree and Doctor Ziegler, and that’s how we know,” Winston explained. 

“Ah. Well, then,” Ana replied, her light voice hiding probably disappointment despite the obvious way she relaxed in relief. 

With the pleasantries out of the way with Ana the attention was forced to focus on Jack, who felt it fixate on himself even before anyone spoke. 

Winston shuffled on his hands and feet awkwardly, first inching a bit closer to him and then back again like he couldn’t decide where he was supposed to stand or what gesture to choose when greeting Jack. He cleared his throat and with a minor hesitation tried: “Ahem, and… Greetings to you as well… Commander.” It was evident that he didn’t know how to call Jack even though he was fully aware of who he was, and the awkwardness manifested in avoidance. 

“Just a soldier now,” Jack grunted back. 

Lena focused on him too and pushed past Winston to look at him, stepping almost too close and leaning slightly into his personal space, and in the few long seconds of silence Jack felt her inspecting gaze on his face, making his scars prickle and eyes compulsively blink. 

“Commander?” Lena said slowly, disbelieving. “Is it really you, Commander Morrison, sir?” 

“Afraid so,” Jack replied and silently prayed that Lena would contain herself. 

Thankfully she did, but not without a sharp gasp and her hands slapping to her mouth. It was easy to imagine her trembling there, staring with wide eyes and fighting to stay proper. “We… We always thought… We just couldn’t – We didn’t dare to hope… And you’ve gone – I mean your eyes – ” she stammered without getting her thoughts together. 

“Yeah, I know,” Jack muttered to stop her flood. He got it. “There’s no need to be so formal about it. I’m just Soldier now.” 

“Of course,” Lena breathed out. She audibly swallowed. 

They were all silent for a moment, their greetings exchanged and the unknown social space beyond that stretching before them. Old formalities and habits weighed on them, making it strange to be suddenly on equal ground – or even having changed places; the base was under new command now, and no matter how unofficial business took place there, it was still a military base and that atmosphere wasn’t going anywhere. The base was the only construction between them that had remained unchanged. 

When the situation threatened to become awkward, Ana took control. “Are we going to stand here in this hall all night? Or do you have some sort of quarters set up here?” 

Winston cleared his throat again. “Yes, yes of course, sorry about that. Um, we have set up in the old housing space. We were just about to have dinner, actually. Uh, follow me, please.” 

Winston shuffled back towards the front door, and Ana and Jack picked up their bags and followed him. Jack felt his way towards the exit with his cane, but once outside Ana took his elbow as they went down the stairs and guided him to follow Winston across the landing site. Lena skipped along, blinking ahead of them every now and then, then returning again like she was herding them somehow. She wasn’t pushy or bothersome, but there was a vague feeling of fussing that was so characteristic of her that her entire being radiated it, and that made Jack shake his elbow lose from Ana’s hold. It wasn’t like this was a strange place or that a full-grown gorilla was too quiet to follow, and all Jack really needed was his cane. 

The walk to the other side of the base was longer than Jack recalled. First the sound of the sea faded, then grew louder again when they got to the other cliff, and then there were more stairs down to the housing spaces built below, inside the cape. 

As soon as they stepped inside, they were met with echoes of noise. Sounds of living came from the heart of the cape, distant but unmistakable. It was warm there too, and a smell of food floated from somewhere to greet them. 

Jack braced his hand on the wall as they climbed down into the old sleeping hall, and once down he reached out for Ana who took a hold of his elbow when they started to make their way through the room. Winston hopped and climbed heavily over the beds and lockers, and Ana guided Jack around them. They walked into a hallway, and the longer they walked the clearer the sounds became. 

Eventually they entered the old mess hall that now echoed empty but the air was rich with a smell of food, and from the back rang greetings to them. 

“Welcome back, Winston! Ooh, you brought guests!” called a voice of a young woman.

“Hello there,” said another woman who couldn't be anyone else but Angela. She sounded as reserved as one would expect, not yet having formed an opinion about their dead officers walking again. 

“Howdy,” grunted Mccree, like Jack's worst nightmare. 

Lena dashed ahead of them once again. “Angie, Jesse, it's really them! Both of them! Can you believe it!? I can hardly believe my own eyes, this is unreal!” 

“Lena, they can hear you,” Winston called after her, awkward. Then he turned to Jack and Ana, coughed and spoke to them with a lowered voice: “Excuse me. Or – actually, excuse her, please. But you must understand, this is a rather exceptional situation.” He sounded so apologetic that Jack could see his drooping brows and pained face in his mind as clear as day. 

That image made Jack wave the apologies aside. “Just leave it, Winston. It's not like there's a protocol in place for a situation like this. We get that this is weird.” 

Ana spoke more softly when she added: “He's right, Winston. We came here knowing that this would be difficult, and we're not expecting any sort of accommodations or special welcomes. Let it be strange, that's how it is.” She was silent in a hesitant sort of way for a second, then added: “We're sorry. For causing you all so much grief.”

Winston hummed at her apologies, clearly not knowing what to say. Instead he coughed and changed the subject: “As I said before, we were just about to have dinner. There's enough for you two as well, so let's just grab you some plates and get to it, yes?” 

“I'm on the plates!” Lena called out, and with the zupping sound of her blink she disappeared into the kitchen to look for those. 

Winston and Ana led Jack to one of the mess hall tables, a long, metallic one with hard benches for seats around it. Winston trotted off to his own seat somewhere, and together Jack and Ana sat down on the bench in a place nearest to them. Jack followed Ana's lead to find the nearest empty seat, and once they had sat down and he had set his cane on the floor, he carefully felt the table in front of him. There was nothing there yet, but soon enough Lena blinked back from the kitchen and a hard porcelain plate and a pair of utensils were set before him. 

The food smelled strikingly familiar, a strong aroma of tomato, basil and cooked pasta in the air, but before Jack had the chance to ask, Lena spoke again: “We're having spaghetti and meatballs! Mostly home-made but not entirely. Great effort was put to this dish, let me tell you!” 

Mccree scoffed on the other side of the table, and Angela chuckled. 

“Meatballs, maybe. But I'm afraid the sauce is mostly made of canned goods. The onions are the only fresh thing that went into it, even the garlics were in a can,” Angela explained. 

The unknown voice of a young woman spoke again: “I made the meatballs, by the way. They are nice and spicy, and I swear in the name of that recipe. It was my mother's and before her it was my grandmother's, and before that it was published in some magazine that she used to read.” 

Mccree scoffed again, but with a hint of a laugh this time. “Truly culinary art, then.” 

“Says the man who cooked the pasta,” the woman flicked back. 

“Enough of bickering, let's just dig in,” Winston interrupted.

“Gladly,” Mccree said, and from that point on a noisy, messy struggle for the food started. People were reaching for the pans and pots with their own fork or with the spoons in them, the benches screeched against the tile floor and plates clattered on the table. 

Jack got a steaming plate of food before him, utensils he found nearby, and a little bit guiltily he dug into his dinner. Hiking up the mountain had left him hungry, he had to admit as much, but somehow it felt wrong to take food from this lot. 

For a moment it was quiet as everyone simply ate. Everyone was clearly hungry, and only the sounds of forks scratching plates and pasta being hogged down filled the old mess hall. 

“So, um... Commanders?” Winston started awkwardly. “I believe I'm speaking for us all when I say that we're glad you're here. We could use all the help we can get. Right now there's only will but not much strength, I'm afraid...” 

Jack sensed Ana getting defensive from her tacked on politeness. “That's nice to hear, Winston, and for what it's worth we're pleased to be here.” 

“Yeah, so nice of you to finally show up,” Mccree huffed from the other side of the table, openly sour. The true implication of his comment didn't escape anyone at the table, and the atmosphere shifted towards awkward again. 

Lena and Winston tried to fix it. “Agent Mccree, I'm not sure that's helpful right now...”

“Jesse! You can't just say stuff like that! It's rude, you don't know what – “

“It's okay,” Ana interrupted them firmly. Her Captain Amari voice silenced the commotion immediately, but when she spoke again, the tone was gone and her voice was soft and understanding: “Jesse, we know that you're upset. And we know that nothing we do or say will change that, yet here we are. We're not going to make excuses for what we did. When Jack and I decided to come here we knew that something like this was inevitable. We are adults, we can face your hurt or your anger, or whatever it is that you feel about us.” 

She paused, and the table was dead silent. “Or you don't have to react to us at all, that's an option too. Whatever you want,” Ana added, and with that she went back to her meal. 

Mccree didn't speak up again, but Jack did detect some irritated huffing from his general direction, and a glass was put on the table with remarkable force too. On a principle Jack agreed with everything Ana had said, that much they had discussed beforehand among themselves, and his rational part knew it was inevitable too: you don't just disappear on a bunch of people close to you, let them believe you're dead, and then show up and try to make it like nothing even happened. People didn't work like that, even Jack knew that, but he still had little interest or energy to deal with them.

Lena tried to lighten the mood again. She cleared her throat quietly before carefully speaking up: “So... Ana, now that you're here... Care to share what you've been up to? And... Commander Morrison too, if he feels up to it?” 

Jack huffed. “I can hear you just fine, no need to talk through Ana,” he said. He was fully aware that he came across unfairly irritated when Lena was probably just shy to talk to him since he himself had sat here mute the entire time, but it was something else in her speech that irked him: “And don't call me Commander. It's just Jack.” 

Ana elbowed him subtly under the table to show exactly what she thought of his snapping, but Jack just shrugged it off. 

Lena recovered quickly. “Oh! Yes, of course, it's just, well. It's a bit strange, we were never in such familiar terms in the past,” she explained in a light tone. 

“It's alright, Lena,” Ana said, probably exasperated by having to keep repeating that over and over, and regardless there was tension in the air. 

“Well, anyway,” Lena quipped, “would you help us? To catch up some?” 

“Yeah, I recon that would be fair,” Mccree joined in, his grave tone hinting that they owed them all that and more. 

“We'd all like to know where you've been at least,” Angela added. 

Jack felt Ana shift by his side and he knew the same as she did: they would have to give in before the pressure, and no matter how much they would have liked to avoid this, they owed this much to their junior agents. All three of them currently present had given years of their lives and every inch of expertise to Overwatch, and even though all of them had enlisted on their own free will, it was a sacrifice that couldn't be ignored or denied. 

Ana had held the reigns of their visit for a good while now, and so Jack felt he owed her a bit more than usual, so he cleared his throat and went first. Ana jolted a bit next to him, her scarf and clothes shuffled, and he imagined her looking at him in surprise. He thought he ought to do better more often now that he had company.

“I was at Zürich when it all went down,” Jack started. “I suppose you've all seen it on the news and papers and so forth. I couldn't tell you anything new about it, so I won't even try. But I was discovered from the ruins along with the rest of the survivors, just never recognized. I didn't give my name. Overwatch was done for, and I decided it was better for everyone if they buried me with it.” Jack kept a short pause, drank some water and waited for the feelings of guilt and regret. None came.

“After I had recovered as much as I could, I left the hospital. Because of this – “ he gestured at his obviously blind eyes, “ – adjusting took some time. I got my aid, the visor I wear, eventually, but before that I did some reflecting on my options. Since Overwatch was sort of everything in my life I decided to see that through, and that's all I've been doing for the past six years. Digging for the truth. That's... That's all there is.” 

“You were at Zürich,” Mccree repeated, sounding oddly hopeful all of a sudden. “And... Reyes? Is he... Is he like you two? Is he with you?” 

Jack felt like an icicle had pierced his chest. He swallowed thickly and his hands squeezed into fists on the table. Ana was equally tense by his side, and Jack realized that everyone in the room was waiting for him to answer. 

He swallowed again, trying to force the strangling feeling and the freezing pain down all at once. “No. He's gone,” he forced himself to answer. “Gone for good.” 

Ana leaned against him lightly for a second before hurrying to save them all from the heavy grief threateningly looming over the table. “We found each other some six months ago,” she said. “I too was wandering, searching for answers. I... I got injured, back then.” Her hand waved in the air, probably pointing at her eyepatch. “Well, you all probably know at this point, but I faced an old comrade in that battle, and I just couldn't bring myself to pull the trigger at Amelie. Unfortunately, she held no such sentiment towards me, and I was left behind. I just couldn't come back after that.” 

Silence fell. Jack wondered if they expected more, something else, perhaps something more conclusive or satisfying, and in that moment Jack himself felt a bit amazed at how there really wasn't anything more than this to say. Everything from the past six years could be summed up in a few sentences even though it felt so much bigger than that, and that realization was followed by a feeling of insignificance and safe invisibility. 

He had succeeded in burying all that he had been. Before it would have taken a good while to sum up everything he was and what he had been doing, there had been such glory and complex, important things to Commander Morrison, but now... He really was just a soldier. A simple man on a simple mission. 

“Well,” Angela said, trying to pick up the mood, “that's not much, but if that's really all then...” 

“I'm afraid it is,” Ana sighed. Her hands rubbed together, making a dry sound. “Sorry about that. I know you expected more from us, but there simply isn't anything.” 

It was Angela who hummed a vaguely accepting sound. “Well, if that's it, then that's it. There's nothing we can do about it.” 

Mccree didn't share her accepting attitude: “Well if you two ain't here to explain yourselves, then why are you really here?” he demanded. “It ain't your call for duty, that would have dragged you back earlier. So why?” He sounded irritated and strained in a way that hinted that he was trying to cover up a whole bunch of other emotions too. 

Jack didn't see a point in beating around the bush: “We have been digging for the truth all these years, and every lead we've got takes us back to Talon. We came to see if you know something that we don't.” 

“Oh,” said Winston, clearly taken aback by the straightforwardness. There was a hint of disappointment in him too, his previous enthusiasm taking a blow. “Well. As a matter of fact, we do. Or – I mean, presumably you don't know this, otherwise you wouldn't be here – but I suppose there's no way to know for sure before we discuss it – “ he was rambling, correcting himself in midsentence and losing the train of his thought along with it. His disappointment became evident the more he rambled. 

“It's alright, love,” Lena said comfortingly, clearly directing her words to Winston, who sighed and quieted down, and while he collected himself, Lena took over: “We appreciate you being here in any case. Of course we'll share our intell, we need all the help we can get just like Winston said. And – “ she hesitated, perhaps still wary of Jack's tempter, “we'll have you here as long as you'd like. It's a pleasure, sir, ma'am.”

The mood didn’t recover. The conversation shifted to other more casual topics, the meal finished and Mccree and the still unknown new arrival, a young woman who avoided Ana and Jack, gathered the plates and utensils and took them back to the kitchen. Winston explained that they took turns with the chores as almost all of them were living here almost permanently – save for Angela who had too much work to actually stay. What he didn’t say but what Ana and Jack both sensed was that Angela didn’t want to stay either. 

The overall mood settled for a stiff, professional one. One thing that stuck with everyone was that Jack and Ana had come because of Talon and nothing else, but despite everything the two of them were still the oldest of them all and carried the old air of authority with them, maybe out of a habit or a memory they all shared, and there was no helping that no matter how much the two former officers wanted to give it up. 

Professionalism gave everyone a frame of mind and an easy script to follow, even if it was lacking any real enforcement. 

Later Ana and Jack set up beds in one of the old offices. They could have set up in the old sleeping hall with the lockers and cots, but apparently no one had any real desire to return to the full glory of the army discipline and camp-like condition, and with so few agents everyone could have their own rooms. 

Jack and Ana got the same room, mainly to save space but also out of practicality. They had saved space in their bags and thus had only one computer, and that single computer had all their information about Reaper. Neither one was too eager to share it. 

They set up beds on opposite walls, and when they were getting ready for bed late that night, Ana brought the dinner table conversation up again: “So we’re not telling them we’re hunting Reaper then?”

Jack was sitting at the edge of his bed and rubbing his sore ankles. “I thought we agreed to keep things close to the chest.” 

Ana huffed, frustrated and somewhat disapproving. “I know, and I agree. But we didn’t agree about lying.”

“You lied too,” Jack reminded her, “and besides, how would we go about this without lying?” 

Ana sighed. Her mattress creaked and the thin pillow let out a thump when she lay down. “I know we have no other choice, and I’m not saying that you made the wrong call. It’s just…” 

Jack waited for her to continue, but the pause just went on. He sensed something sentimental in that silence and wanted to instinctually shrink away from it. “What?” he asked. 

“No, it just felt so bad to hear you lie about him like that,” she explained, her tone a bit avoiding. “Considering what he was to you, the right to be truthful about this should be yours.”

Grief was uncomfortably close. It was a heavy weight not only in Jack’s chest but on his shoulders too. He wanted to lay down and curl up under the covers and go to sleep already. 

“What would I even say?” he asked with a sigh. “I have no special desire to receive awkward condolences from people I used to know. What I want even less is to explain to everyone that my marriage went straight to hell to the point that my ex has now enlisted into that very terrorist organisation that we dedicated our lives to take down, and just last spring emptied a round from a shotgun into my backside.” He started out lightly, trying to cover his bitterness and grief with dry humour, but the last words he all but spat out anyway. He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“Just… Let them believe he’s dead. You know that’s not entirely untrue either. I’ll… handle it, somehow. See this through.”

Ana didn't respond to that, she didn't even sigh. The room felt empty with just the two of them. 

“Jesse didn't take to us too well,” she said.

Jack shrugged. “It could have been worse.”

“Yes, I know. I almost wish it had, I know how to deal with his anger and yelling and tears. But this silent, cold and distant he's giving us? That is unfamiliar.”

Jack was amused in a horrible, cynical sort of way. His heart ached. “You mean he's grown up?”

It seemed like Ana didn't even breathe for a moment. Then she laughed, a little quick and breathless sound that tried to ease something that she felt. ”Oh, I... I didn't even think of that,” she muttered, “I suppose you're right... He's handling himself very well. Hmm.” 

A lot of changes had happened while they were gone, but this wasn't one of them. Mccree had been past thirty when Ana had last seen him, and by then he had been more like this stable and capable man than the overtly aggressive, defensive young fugitive they had recruited back in the day. Jack wondered if Ana ever really let go of her protective attitude, or had that just been called forth by calls for “Commander Amari”. 

“He would be proud of him,” Ana whispered. 

Jack’s heart thumped in a painful sort of way, like it was too heavy and only barely managed to do its job of keeping him alive. Like it barely bothered when it wasn’t explicitly requested. “Yeah,” Jack breathed harshly. His throat itched. “He would. And Jesse won’t forgive me if he ever finds out the truth about him.” 

The mattress on the other side of the room creaked when Ana rolled onto her side. Only the way her voice sounded told Jack that she had turned to face him instead of turning her back, something he was relieved to hear. “Then he won’t find out. That’s what we do, us old ones. Protect the young ones from the things they don’t have to know.” 

Jack could only agree. When he rubbed his hands against his tired face he felt the loose skin and the wrinkles more clearly than usual. He pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes until he saw stars. “It should be easy to keep this under the lid. Taking things to the grave should be easy when said grave already exists.” He meant it as a joke but it didn’t sound like it, and Ana didn’t even huff at it. 

They had talked about the personal flipside of this topic more today than they had in past six months, and it had left Jack exhausted, and yet he just couldn’t sleep. 

“I need to optimize the visor,” he said and got up. “I’ll do that now. You go ahead and sleep, this might take some time.” He took his duffel and almost escaped the room, and Ana didn’t try to stop him. 

The old command centre was empty now that Winston shared a room with Lena on the other side of the base. The computer system was well-maintained as could be expected of Winston, and after a short chat with Athena Jack even found that he still had the authority to access the system. He wouldn’t have needed an authorization, but it did make things easier for him. 

When the red-tinted feed of the visor came through, Jack took a proper look around. He could only turn around in the office and take about two steps because of the cables hooking the visor into the computer, but it was enough. It was exactly how he recalled it being, but now it looked more lived in than it had before. It was no wonder since Winston seemed to spend most of his time there, and about half of the lower floor had been turned into his laboratory and taken over by his projects. 

The visor’s basic functions worked even when its programming was being debugged, and so Jack got a clear picture of his surroundings without any pixelization, delays or blurring. Only the HUD was empty, no measuring or targeting system available, and so he had to be content with his very human-like visual aid. It was enough for him to spot something that definitely hadn’t been there when he had last visited the base, and those were bullet holes and blackened spots that looked like explosion burns in the walls. 

“Athena,” he called, “where did those battle marks come from?” 

“The remains of a battle were a result of an attack by a strike squad of Talon. Their mission: to extract Overwatch database of all enlisted agents and their locations. The mission was unsuccessful,” Athena answered. 

Jack jolted at the mention of Talon. “And when was this attack?”

“The attack was carried out last year, on the same day the Overwatch Recall was instigated. The Recall was sent out as a reaction to the Talon strike.” 

“Naturally,” Jack muttered to himself. “Were any Talon agents recognized?” 

“The attack was carried out by eight Talon agents, seven were standardly equipped without any visible or detected chemical or mechanical enhancements. The attack was led by a Talon mercenary who was armed with two shotguns, used an unknown form of technological enhancement, and was recognized by codename Reaper.” 

Jack stared at the bullet marks on the walls, his heart drumming in his throat. Winston had failed to mention that incident yet. Reaper had been here before he had attacked him in Egypt. Extracting their database no less, trying to get Talon the names and locations of Overwatch agents? That could be only for one thing, and it made cold sweat brim on Jack’s skin. This was another depth of betrayal and he felt nauseated with it. “Really now,” he said out loud to Athena. “And is this the only incident the mercenary Reaper has struck an Overwatch base?” 

“Inconclusive,” Athena replied, “but as far as my surveillance reaches, yes.” 

Jack let out a suffering sigh, and suddenly tired he dropped into the office chair by the computer. “Really? Well, that’s good, then. That’s good,” he said and spun around in the chair to look out of the window instead. It was a beautiful, clear night outside. Jack watched the lighthouse and its sweeping light out on the sea. 

Reaper wasn’t pulling any punches, it seemed. Jack realized he had been fooling himself all this time and thought that it probably wasn’t that bad, that he might have been working with the enemy but it was just because of the opportunity and gain, money or something like that, not because he wanted to go after them like that. Jack had thought that maybe there was a way to be gentlemanly about this, maybe it was just some unrelated conflict of interests, after all Reaper hadn’t seriously hurt him when they had crossed paths in Egypt. 

He could have shot Jack in the head instead of the lower back. He had chosen to wound, not kill. Even when it was clear that Reaper had no problem killing indiscriminately nowadays, for profit, Jack had focused on the small mercy and comforted himself with it. Mercenary was practically a normal career path for a soldier who has lost what he had been previously fighting for, there was nothing personal to it, it was just bad luck and circumstances. 

But to hunt down Overwatch agents? Their own hand-picked, personally trained elite heroes? There was nothing unclear or ambiguous about it. 

Where Jack wanted to dig up the truth and find answers, Gabriel was trying to destroy and kill everything that remained. 

Jack felt hollow inside, and he winced when he forgot to keep himself from thinking about Reaper’s former name. He needed a drink. 

If Ana had noticed she had chosen to ignore it, but the whiskey bottle Jack had hoarded had found its way to the duffel with other viably important equipment he carried, and now Jack bowed down to fish it and a steel field mug out. 

He sloshed a generous amount of liquor into the mug, put the cap back on the bottle and left it on the desk. 

For the time being he had to settle for looking at the drink though, the optimizing of the visor was still not done and even though he didn’t have to keep wearing it while the process was on-going, it did bring him some solace as it was. 

“You know you won’t be paid for over-time here, right, sir?” called a high-pitched female voice from the catwalk outside the office. 

Jack stood up from the chair to locate the speaker, and now he saw the new addition to the team he hadn’t recognized by her voice during dinner. She was a petite young Asian woman, dressed in black collage trousers and a fluffy pink sweater, her brown hair was up in a high ponytail and she was regarding him from the door with her arms crossed, eyes sharp. 

“I haven’t been called ‘sir’ in a while, miss,” Jack answered. “I’m only a soldier these days.”

The woman’s gaze flicked over him from head to toe in a second, and she stepped in just enough to lean on the doorframe. “So you may say, but I’ve been taught to respect my senior officers regardless of what they say, especially if what they say is dumb, sir.” 

“Now you’re being rude, miss,” Jack pointed out. 

“Sorry, sir,” she said without sounding like it. “But you do know you’re not getting any brownie points by staying up late, right?”

Jack scoffed and rolled his eyes under the visor. “I’m not doing this for anyone else. I’m maintaining my equipment,” he explained, tapping the mask. “And I couldn’t sleep anyway.”

“Oh, I see,” the woman said. Her eyes dropped to the desk. “Are you drinking?” 

Jack felt strangely called out, even a bit embarrassed before a younger agent. “Ah… Yeah, now that you mentioned it. A bad habit. Don’t pick that up.” 

“May I join you?” she asked. 

“Uh…” Jack considered it. He had been looking forward to some time alone, but now that he was here he recalled why Ana’s presence had been so God sent: peace and quiet might mean that others didn’t poke his personal issues, but it also meant that he had the time to drown in them by himself. And considering the whiskey bottle was almost half full, his issues weren’t the only thing he could drown in. “Sure,” he said, and with the permission the young woman skipped into the room.

“Sweet!” she quipped, and her arms dropped from their knot and dived behind her back. She didn’t come straight to the desk but walked around the office, peeked at the computer running and walked to the windows. 

“I didn’t catch your name,” Jack said.

“My codename is D.va, but my actual name is Song, Hana,” the woman said. “I was drafted to the Korean army during the Omnic Crisis. I operated one of those big mechs in Mobile Exo-Force.” 

“Oh, you’re a veteran then,” Jack said. 

“Yep.” 

“Welcome to Overwatch, soldier. What’s your rank?” 

Song turned back towards him from the window and approached the desk. “Sergeant.” 

Jack nodded his acknowledgements. 

Song was quiet for a while, regarding him from the other side of the desk. She fiddled with her hands, and suddenly blurted out: “And you’re Commander Morrison. Aren’t you?” 

Now it was Jack’s turn to be taken aback. He straightened up and took another look at the young Song. “Who told you that?” 

The woman was now almost bouncing on her feet, barely controlling her visible excitement. “Oh come one, sir, don’t give me that, I’m not stupid! Who else would Winston and Tracer send for but you?! Of course you’re alive, there’s no way someone like you could be taken down in an attack like Zürich! Please tell me, what have you really been up to behind the scenes?!” 

Her eyes were practically shining when the flood of questions poured out, and Jack had to look away from that hopeful, admiring shine. 

“Hm. It was probably hard for you to keep all that in during dinner,” Jack said. 

“Well, I wasn’t sure about you then yet, but now I am,” Song explained, “you are Strike-Commander Morrison, aren’t you? Aren’t you?”

There was no way for Jack to avoid such a straightforward question. “I was.” 

Song let out a strange, tense puff of air, like she was just barely keeping herself from squeeing aloud. She bit her lip and with great effort gathered herself. “Oh my god,” she breathed, “I… You… You’re a hero! One of the greatest heroes of our time!” 

“You’re giving me too much credit, kid,” Jack huffed, “it’s never just one man doing anything, it takes a whole crew to steer a ship.”

“No, you don’t understand,” Song insisted, “Overwatch was, like, this big dream for me! For all of us affected by the Omnic Crisis as heavily as we were! You’re a legend! A super soldier who went in impossible fights and still came out fine! You built one of the greatest organizations in history, and you ended the Crisis! How is that not a mark of a real hero?!” 

Jack listened to Song ramble on excitedly. It was like a voice from the past that sang about shining shields and glory, it was the voice that announced high ranks and gave away medals and awards, that hoisted up flags and gave magnificent, pompous speeches. It was also the voice that soothed the losses with talk about eternal glory, honour and duty. A voice Jack knew too well. He didn’t hate it, he didn’t fear it, it didn’t bring back anything horrid, but it was an echo of something long lost, something from the past. It was an echo of youth, and it reminded Jack of foolishness. 

Instead of giving a warning lecture, Jack reached for the fastenings of the visor and undid it. The link disabled and the visual feed cut, and Jack was once again left in the blurry darkness with only the bright computer screens visible smudges in the mist. The program was still being worked, but Jack set the mask on the desk, pulled the chair under him again and sat down. 

“You look young. Are you old enough to drink?” he asked.

“I’m nineteen, sir,” Song said. 

“So no.”

“I am where I come from!”

Jack sighed. “Well, whatever. I’m not your father any more than your commanding officer. Suit yourself.” He offered the mug to Song and picked up the bottle himself. When Song took the mug from his hand, Jack opened the bottle, set the cap on the table next to the visor where he’d easily find it later and gulped down a mouthful of whiskey straight from the bottle. 

“Heroism is just talk and ideals kid,” he said. “It exists in stories. In real life though… We were just doing our jobs.” 

“Maybe so,” Song admitted, some of her enthusiasm evening in her voice. “But that doesn't mean you didn't stand for heroism. You inspired a generation, there's no denying that.”

Jack took another swig from the bottle. It was an uncouth way to drink and he felt ashamed of himself, but the burn of the liquid felt good and slowly it was raising that haze in his head, and he knew from experience that he wouldn't feel ashamed of himself soon. “What you think of anything is your own business, kiddo. That's got nothing to do with me.”

Song was quiet. Her fingers brushed against the mug a bit and there was a soft swallowing sound, so she was at least tasting the liquid. No coughing or sputtering followed, and Jack was distantly pleased. 

“Look, sir, I don't know where you've been – ” Song started.

Jack interrupted: “Damn straight.” 

“ – but you got to know that what you stood for is important. Commander Morrison was an international hero. He stood for peace, for international co-operation and friendship across borders,” she defiantly finished. 

Jack shrugged. “This Commander Morrison sounds like a swell guy. But you didn't know him, you just knew what he stood for. You know the carefully crafted image of Overwatch, the shining surface and the face attached to it. That man you're speaking so highly about wasn't some great hero, he was just a mask.” 

“Don't think I'm some naïve little child who doesn't understand how the world works,” Song interjected surprisingly harshly. Her tone and phrasing were still polite, but there was a sharp ring to them, like she was steeling herself against Jack's words. “I know things are complicated and that big, international organizations don't run on hand-holding and tea. But they run, they are run by people, and doing that amount of work is heroic. Standing up for what's right, putting your foot down and saying 'enough', and joining together with others is heroic, no matter what one person turns out to be. Or fails to live up to.” 

Her words stung, Jack wasn't yet drunk enough to not feel that. He took a heavy gulp of whiskey like it was a proper reply. The admiration Song had given him earlier had turned into an attitude, but she kept it in check, perhaps out of principle or pride. She reminded him of himself when he had been young. 

Jack let the bottle rest against his knee. “I can see that you aspire to do great things, Sergeant Song. And perhaps you're looking to the right direction, perhaps you've got your priorities straight, I wouldn't know. But if you think you'll find those shining things, that heroism you're talking about here, you're wrong.” 

Song sipped her whiskey and smacked her lips. “Or maybe I'm exactly in the right place. You can't win if you don't play.” 

“This isn't a game!” Jack snapped. He didn't even feel bad about his tone, just let the words sink in. “And there are no heroes here. People here are just breaking the law.” 

Song let out a quiet laugh. “Forgive me, sir, but that's pretty rich of you to say. I've seen Soldier 76 on the news.”

Jack scoffed and drank. “That's not the point. Amari and I are old, we can afford to pull off stunts like that. We've got nothing to lose anymore. Hell, we're both as good as dead already, what do a few broken laws got on that?” He huffed a laugh that scratched the insides of his throat, a raspy sound that was as bitter as it was painful. “We've got graves already, all we got to do is fill them. But you... You are still young. There's hope for you yet, you’ve got a life ahead of you, so much to live for. You shouldn't waste it by playing a hero.” 

Song was silent after his little outburst, and this time the silence didn't have that defying edge or any of the earlier attitude. Jack counted that as a victory of sorts: if he could make the youth quiet down with his hard-learned truths he wasn't a totally useless old man after all. Maybe he got something to pass on. 

“I'm really sorry for your loss,” Song muttered quietly.

She didn't specify, but Jack got the picture. “Yeah. Thanks.” He drank. The haze was almost there. He felt that first little tilt in his balance even when sitting down and the drowsiness in his movements, promising to pull him under into deep sleep when he would finally be ready. 

“I always looked up to Commander Reyes too,” Song told him softly. “I've read everything about him and what he did during the Crisis. He was so courageous and such a genius tactician. It must have been so amazing to fight by his side.”

“Yeah, it was. He was a great squad leader,” Jack heard himself reciting. “It was a real honour to be there with him. I couldn't have become the officer I later was if it wasn't for him.” He didn't know where all this was coming from, it just did. Words poured out of him like a pre-written speech, like he had somehow memorized and practised all of that all the way to automatic function. It was like some other man was speaking of things past with Jack's mouth. Maybe it was the alcohol. 

Song was quiet a little too long for it to be natural. She had probably too noticed the strange flood of feelings and words about glorious battles and brothers in arms, but she recovered quickly, and encouraged by the frankness asked: “What was he really like?” 

Jack licked his lips and chuckled weakly to himself. “What was my husband like? I was with him for almost thirty years. Don't you have any easier questions?”

Song laughed, suddenly awkward and endearing. “Oh, yes... Of course, sorry about that. I just... What was he really like, as a person? What was he like to hang out with, for example? What was it like to be his friend?”

It was one of those hard, toxic questions that lured Jack deep into his mind, in those depths of memories he tried to avoid. They were intoxicating and addictive like the purest heroin, and so sweet he could practically feel them corroding through his steely discipline and the determination of the soldier. He took a deep inhale and leaned back in the chair.

“He was... My best friend,” he began, imagining that year when he was eighteen and just enlisted. “I always had friends, but never anyone that good. Only when I met him and we became friends I really understood what friendship could be. I mean... It might have been the war, or maybe he had just matured enough to figure his way through all that macho bullshit faster than others, but to me he was so special. 

“You know how there are those people you simply click with? Well, we clicked. He was my senior and all, but when we got to know each other it happened so fast and so naturally it was as if we had always known each other. We got each other, we could spend hours just talking, he never made me feel stupid or embarrassed and I could just tell him stuff about myself and how I really felt. It was all so easy...” Jack felt himself drifting. Staring into the swirling mist that was his vision he could almost go back to their first army training camp, the chilly barracks, the noisy mess hall, the endless fields of sand. He could smell the bunks and hear the locker doors creak, and he recalled the textures of the pillow cases and smelled the remains of the laundry deterrent. 

The memory was more intoxicating and its burn more real than the whiskey in the bottle. He sighed.

“Reyes was an amazing officer,” he continued. “Always on the side of his own squad, always on top of the situation. Or, well, later I realized that he didn't actually know that much, no junior officer does – or anyone in the field for that matter – but he always knew what he was doing, and we never felt like he was fumbling. Even the shittiest of situation felt calm and in control when he led us.” 

Especially in the early days of the Omnic Crisis, when they were truly fighting tooth and nail against all odds, the field missions had barely been mission at all. They had been old-fashioned battles on foot, and the situation was often so purely chaotic that everything was left up to a chance.

Jack recalled his own first mission, how afraid he had been and how the fear had practically paralyzed him at first. Fear had left such a strong mark over the memory that he barely recalled anything at all about it, it was all just a blur of deafening noise, yelling and gun fire, and heat and smell of pulse ammunition burning. What he did recall was Gabe, breathing as heavily as he was, sweating and also afraid but not in his first rodeo, reaching over to him and coaxing Jack on the move again. He had talked to him, and with his calm encouragement Jack had finally gotten a hold of his own fear and managed to get on the move, and their troops followed suit. 

There was always something about Gabe's face, especially about his eyes and the line of his mouth, that could just radiate calm and courage. With one look he could give that needed extra push, or make you believe that everything was fine, or at least that everything would be fine. As a drill sergeant he had been stern and later in life he grew into quite an intimidating, even frightening persona, but to Jack he was always something soft and calming. 

Especially when their mutual friendly gestures and emotional support stopped being rough hugs and slaps on the back and turned into long embraces, caresses and kisses. 

The memory physically hurt, and Jack took an angry swig out of the bottle to soothe it. 

He had almost forgotten about Song and startled a bit when she spoke: “And then you married him, didn't you?” 

Jack squeezed his left hand into a fist and rubbed the backs of his fingers with the thumb. “Yeah. I married my best friend. How's that for a cliché happy ending?” 

“That's kind of sweet,” Song said, honest and open. 

“Yeah, so I’ve heard,” Jack said. He hoped all his attitude about the whole thing could be explained away with grief. Everyone knew that Gabriel Reyes had died at Zürich, and maybe that and Jack's awkwardly fitting status as a widow kept them from prying about their so called shoot out before the explosion. 

Song shifted, a bit self-conscious perhaps. “I'm really sorry for your loss.”

“So you’ve all said,” Jack pointed out tiredly. 

“Yes, but it bears repeating. It really does,” Song insisted gently, “even... Even if it makes you uncomfortable. I can see you don't want to talk about it.” 

Jack shrugged. “Who would want to talk about the death of their spouse?”

“Uh… Everyone?” Song suggested like it was given. “I mean, it is painful, and I can’t even begin to imagine what it is like to be with one person for that long, love them every day, and then lose them. I don’t really even understand it. Your marriage lasted longer than I have lived! And…” she hesitated again, like when she was shying away from Jack’s supposed hero status. “…I kind of admired that about you two. Like, Commander Reyes was no less a hero, and… I heard of your marriage. I’m sort of a fan, actually. I wish I’ll have something like that one day.” 

Jack had to laugh at that. It was a bitter sound, something that he recognized as old even though he rarely felt like that about himself, and he wished he could just unload the burden on this young soldier and let her know all the ugliness that there was to their story. 

He almost wished he could spill it all, but then again even when drunk he valued the secrecy they had sworn into with Ana, like the last kind deed they’d do for the younger ones. 

Also Jack sort of valued the truth, what had come of them and how it all had ended. It was something precious and golden, something that belonged only to him, and in some sick way he cherished Reaper too. That twisted, horrid abomination of a creature had been born out of their love, somehow becoming like a result of it. Reaper was the full payoff, the price, the punishment reserved for them for having something so wonderful for too long. 

And Jack didn’t want to share that. 

A part of it was sympathy he felt for that sparkly eyed, young future hero. She could keep her dreams and ideals for now, Jack wouldn’t grind them down. Life would, in time. 

Jack lifted the bottle to his lips. “Yeah… Keep looking.” 

Little did she know just how tightly Reaper was tied to him, and everything he touched. Death cast a deep shadow over the old and the young alike.


	3. ii.ii Summon a villain

Gabriel Reyes was having a bad pain day.

He might have been hiding behind his expressionless skullmask that provided him with the timeless image of death and some dignity, but despite that he couldn’t just ignore the decay and rebirth his body was cycling through. Because as much as he willed himself to be Reaper, that eternal being made of bone and inevitably, his body still had a will of its own and it paid no mind to what Gabriel wanted. 

And the body ached. It ached, it hurt, it agonized, and the swarm of nanobots feasting on his dying cells and aiding his body to imitate life felt no pity either. The process of rebirth, that technological miracle, felt like waves of pain through Gabriel’s entire body. Everything in him hurt, his skin, his muscles, his nerves, his veins, his bones. The pain made him aware of every single piece that made him, and the pain didn’t let him forget. So Gabriel ached in his own regenerating skin and hoped he could become his mask so fully he wouldn’t have to be aware and disgusted by himself.

But as he had learned a long time ago, life refused to stop to accommodate his pain and simply went on, and so he had to respond when Akande Ogundimu summoned his deadliest mercenary.

This Talon base was a communication hot spot and a cradle of goods it had hoarded. It was a gamble of isolation and safety by being a ship, a large cargo ship masked as an ordinary shipper of fish and oil, but in truth being an aimlessly drifting ship of Talon, equipped with a fully manned battle stations, laboratories and medical facilities, as well as fully prepared to offer every luxury high-ranking agents could dream to have. Everything was hidden away either among the heavy crates strapped to the decks and below, or built inside the ship were the modest cabins should be.

Gabriel Reyes knew nothing more than that they were slowly sailing along the West African coast, well into the international waters and beyond the course of other sea traffic. He had gotten himself an ordinary cabin, one well below the deck and supposedly safe from the nonsense the high-ranking agents might come up with, but still the summon reached him like always, and he had to go. 

He travelled down toward the very bottom decks the ship had, so down it was echoing with the heavy noise of the ocean hitting the bottom of the ship, and Gabriel found that one large, red crate he had been described to. It was in the midst of everything else, but he found it. 

He didn’t bother with knocking since he had been summoned, and simply stepped into the crate. 

Outside it might had looked like anything else, an ordinary cargo thing with a rusty red paint cover, but inside it was something completely else. The walls shone with pearly white, fresh paint, the floor was smooth and covered with thick, velvet carpet, and instead of stock of fish it was furnished like a hotel suite or perhaps a very extravagant office. There was a large oak desk and a chair of the same material, an antique couch with luxurious looking matching armchairs, a liquor cabinet, and an extensive computer system put together on the desk. By the desk there was a light table full of fine mechanical instruments and computer systems, and the Doomfist gauntlet lay on the table in the middle of calibrations. The only less fancy thing in the crate was the lightning, basic fluorescent lights connected to each other in rows in the ceiling. 

“You called me?” Gabriel said. 

Ogundimu lifted a finger to silence him. He had an ear piece on and he seemed to be in the middle of a phone call. 

Gabriel closed the crate door and stood still, waiting for his turn. He assumed the at ease position with his feet apart and hands behind his back and tried to will the pain into submission. There was business to attend to, and it knew no limits of physical bodies or pain, and so neither did he. A dead man walking could only attend. Gabriel silenced his pain and stood rigid, waiting. 

Ogundimu was tending to business in Swahili, and judging by his light tone and occasional burst of laughter, it was a business call with an old, well-trusted associate. Ogundimu talked and leisurely paced behind the desk, brushed his fingers against its dark polished surface, hummed in accepting tone to his associate, then listened quietly for a minute, then launched on a detailed monologue about something that went on for several minutes, uninterrupted. There was no room for interruptions or questions. Ogundimu didn’t glance at Gabriel even once as the call went on, and he didn’t need to. Gabriel wasn’t going anywhere, and he was known for his endless patience that he showed with his unwavering pose that he had learned from the army, and the dead had nothing but time anyway. 

Ogundimu paced some more and wandered from the desk to the table where his gauntlet was, tracing his fingers lightly across its armouring and fingered its shining joints. 

Finally the call ended, Ogundimu brushed his ear piece and finally turned to Gabriel.

“Reaper. Come in, please. We have matters to discuss,” Ogundimu said, beckoning Gabriel to step further inside. 

Gabriel obeyed, crossing the velvet carpet and stopping a good four feet away from the oak desk. The crate might have been decorated like a luxurious office catering to the Talon leader’s every need and desire, but it was still a crate: windowless and narrow, and it felt claustrophobic, like walking into a mouse trap. Before the desk Gabriel stilled and assumed his previous stance, at ease and ready to listen. 

“We need to discuss the questionable success of your previous missions,” Ogundimu said. 

The skullmask hurt against Gabriel’s skin, like his very own skull had been pushed through his skin and outside where it really shouldn’t be. He narrowed his eyes slightly behind the eye holes. “Pardon me, but ‘my questionable success’?” he asked.

Ogundimu picked out his ear piece, threw in on the desk and turned towards his high-grade computer system. He flicked his wrist slightly against the hologram controls, and the complex system of glass screens and hard-light system controls lit up and came to life. “Yes, that exactly,” Ogundimu affirmed. “I have been through most of the files about things that went on before I was able to rejoin Talon, and it would seem that operative Reaper – you – has been a very hard-working operative indeed. And an efficient and successful one too!” Ogundimu brushed at the controls and browsed through mission reports, flicking glowing file icons past him one after another. “Lately perative Reaper seems to work mostly in the field, alone or assisted by only a few other high-profile operatives, like operative Widowmaker and operative Sombra. Good backup choices, I must admit. Passable tactical decisions too.” 

With a flick of his left hand Ogundimu brought up the operative profiles of both Widowmaker and then Sombra. He glanced both of them over as if evaluating them on the spot, then closed the profiles again.

“But where operative Reaper has mostly been as a whole is on the training and planning side,” he said. “It seems that for the past six years a sizable portion of Talon operatives have Reaper to thank for their skills in the field, as well as mission plans. I would even say that there are few missions run around here without operative Reaper having something to do with it.” 

Ogundimu paused, and after a few moments it became clear he had finished his overview. He was staring down at Reaper with an expectant look on his face and he had stopped browsing his computer’s database. Everything about him seemed to be inviting input, and yet he hadn’t asked a question. 

Gabriel stared back at the man. The mask felt comfortable again. “Your summary of my work is accurate. And yet I don’t see what it has to do with my ‘questionable success’, as you put it,” he said. 

Ogundimu was silent for a second, finishing his sizing up, but then broke their eye contact and started to tap at his system again. “This is not yet the questionable part,” he said. “What is, however, are the missions where you have failed to demonstrate this enthusiastic work ethic and expert skills that seem to come so easily to you. These missions being Numbani, Gibraltar and Egypt.”

Each mission was brought up as a glimmering hard light projectile in the tips of Ogundimu’s fingers. His dark gaze was piercing. 

Gabriel knew each mission, as well as where the conversation was going. “In Numbani Widowmaker and I encountered unforeseeable chaotic elements. We recognized the situation lost and so we retreated. In Gibraltar our squad encountered a hostile AI and weaponry previously unseen. In Egypt our forces were outmatched by older soldiers with more expertise and the risk was greater than the reward, so I deemed it best to retreat,” Gabriel listed off easily. He knew exactly what was behind each and every decision, and even though he had a hunch of what Ogundimu was suspecting here it didn’t make any difference because it was a false suspicion up against the truth. He felt calm and reassured. 

“Hm. You seem to be very confident in your point of view about these missions,” Ogundimu suggested. 

“It is all in my reports,” Gabriel replied. 

Ogundimu scoffed, and then leaving the files up like a series of reminders, he walked over to the liquor cabinet, pulled out two classes and a crystal bottle of whiskey. “Yes, I have read your reports, operative,” he said while making his way back to the desk with his bearings, “and I doubt them. You are very confident in your opinions, but here I express doubt in that opinion what you call truth.” 

Glasses were unceremoniously dropped on the table, and Ogundimu sloshed whiskey into both of them. The harsh movement looked messy, but nothing was spilled, and the glasses were even. He picked one glass up and returned to sizing Gabriel up. 

“You see, these are all missions of you going up against Overwatch agents,” he said. “Against your old friends and even family. My question is, do you confess to some sentimentality after all? Or are you just incapable of defeating Overwatch agents? Either way, I’d like to know. This is all very questionable.” 

Gabriel stared somewhere behind Ogundimu, level and unwavering. “Overwatch might be a fallen giant, but their agents still have their training. They are a difficult enemy to defeat. Underestimating them would be a grievous mistake.” 

Ogundimu took a swig of the liquor and raised an eye brow. “Are you saying it’s natural that our operatives lost to Overwatch? Should I accuse you of defeat mongering while we’re at this too?” 

“Not at all. Our previous losses have been either due to a surprise element or a tactical retreat. They might not look flashy or make us feel good, but they are not shameful or nothing to lose faith over. We will succeed in the future,” Gabriel recited just as he had planned. And then for a good measure added: “The hit of Katya Volskaya was also a failure. I would suggest for it to be added to this evaluation even though you didn’t approve of the hit in the first place.” 

This addition seemed to please Ogundimu. He huffed a sound that was almost a laugh, took another careful mouthful of his liquor and took his stern gaze off Gabriel for a moment. 

“So it’s a no to sentimentality, then?” he asked.

Gabriel sharpened. “There’s no sentimentality. Reaper has no friends, Reaper has no family. There’s nothing to be sentimental over.” 

Ogundimu laughed at his comment, then clicked his tongue. He reached for his computer again, this time brushing aside all other mission files except the one of Egypt. Gabriel didn’t look down at the system, but he recognized the picture on the icon from the yellow shine of the desert sands. 

“Not even for your spouse?” Ogundimu pressed on. “I heard it was quite a fairy tale. A story for the ages. Are you certain you’re not even a little bit nostalgic?” 

“Reaper doesn’t have a spouse,” Gabriel replied calmly. “Strike-Commander Morrison was married to Commander Reyes. Commander Reyes is dead. Death has done them apart.”

Again Ogundimu seemed pleased with the answer. He nodded in acceptance and closed the file on Egypt. “Good. Because operative Reaper is what I need now, and I plan to give him a chance to bid his skills against Overwatch again very soon, and there’s no room for any funny business. Are you prepared?” 

Gabriel didn’t let his gaze drop from the spot. “The dead are always prepared. There’s nothing else to do.”

So he received a mission, another take of a previous failed one. He listened to the briefing intently, his skull face unmoving and red eyes behind the eye holes dull in attention. He had no questions and no comments to make when the briefing was over, and he was dismissed. 

The deck of the ship was overtly bright and warm when he stepped on it. The wind pulled at his clothes and hurt the little skin that was exposed to it, and with his mission on the top of his mind he made his way quickly below the deck and the cabins where the gear and weapons were stored. 

The mission was a simple yet hard one. They still needed those names, and they were certainly worth of another strike to the Gibraltar base. Besides, it was a chance to prove himself once and for all. 

The whole idea of Reaper was to be like the image he had taken. Death. Impassionate, remorseless, certain and merciless. Cold and impersonal. That was what Reaper was, for death had freed him from the duties and debts of the life of Gabriel Reyes. 

It was cool and dark below the deck, and it was gentle for his sore, aching body. The cool air sneaked under his clothes and soothed the regenerating tissue, like a light anaesthesia a tooth ache. 

Simple work was welcome. Being idle seemed to make the pains worse somehow, like he was mummifying and withering in boredom and had to tear himself open to regenerate again. 

He geared up with ease, each piece of gear like a bandage on his empty corpse of a being. Every piece of armour, every belt and round of ammo were like missing limbs returned to him, and everything else from his boots to cloves to the coat and socks were a part of a stern shell that contained him and gave him form. He could breathe easy under his heavy gear, and his guns were even more familiar. They were a comfortable weigh in his hold, and he could take them apart, check and put them back together again in the dark. 

He was prepared to go.

When he stepped outside from the cabin, there was someone clearly waiting for him in the hallway. 

Moira glanced him over clinically. “Heading out again, are we?” There was a smile on her lips, like always nowadays. 

Reaper didn’t let her bother him. “Yes. I was just briefed. It’s a solo mission, extraction.”

“Ah, sounds very mundane if you ask me. Are you certain you will be able to handle it?” Her question was casual, always mockingly so, but then doubt caught up with Reaper. Moira wasn’t working under him anymore. They might have been a part of the same organization, but she had her own division and her own orders now. 

He took another look at her. She was positively nonthreatening in her casual straight trousers and a loose dress shirt, but the sickly purple veins in her other arm reminded him of what she truly was, and a suspicion that she had been sent to evaluate him rose. 

“I am fully functional. Or would you like to examine me again before I leave?” Reaper asked. Even if he was made to strip and lie on an operation table there was nothing her scans would reveal. There was nothing to reveal. 

“No, your own evaluation is quite enough for me,” Moira flippantly replied, but that knowing smile didn’t leave her face. 

“Then what are you doing here? This is a solo mission. I can dress myself, thank you,” Reaper said, tossing the lapels of his coat over his legs. 

“Yes, yes of course you can,” Moira admitted. She tilted her head, and her cool, calculating look went over the man again. “It’s just that you are a sight to behold when you’re about to dive into action, Reaper.” 

“Flattery doesn’t suit you,” Reaper replied drily. 

Moira tilted her head into another direction now, and her brow rose as did her amusement. “It’s no flattery, it’s scientific curiosity. And you were and continue to be one of my most engaging subjects.”

There were no feelings to experience about that, so Reaper didn’t react. “And what exactly about my routine intrigues your scientific interest?” 

Moira shrugged lightly. “It’s not the routine, no. Your routine is utterly predictable and boring – hence why it is called routine. And yet… You are such an interesting creature to observe.” 

Reaper spread his arms, flexing his talons. “I still don’t see what you are after.” 

Moira didn’t reply right away. One of her long, sharp nails scratched the underside of her sharp chin as her gaze flickered over Reaper’s form. 

“You are headed to Gibraltar again, yes?” 

“If you know, then you know. There’s nothing I can either deny or confirm.”

Moira hummed, her smile tilting. “Isn’t it interesting that you’re sent alone on a mission that you previously couldn’t complete with a fully trained operative squad?” 

“It’s not that unusual. But you’re not educated in tactics, are you, doctor?” Reaper answered as passively as he could. 

Moira breathed a soundless laugh. “Well, no, I am not educated in the art of war… But something else I have a deep knowledge about. Human nature, that is.”

Reaper gave her a suffering look. “You are a biologist with genetics as your specialty. That’s not the same as human nature.” 

“I disagree,” Moira said. “The scientific community has agreed that there’s no soul even though we were previously convinced that there is. Now we talk about body and mind, and yet my research suggests that there’s no separate mind either, only the brain and whatever flippant, subjective experiences it produces. I would argue that there’s only body. Flesh is all there is, that’s where everything comes from and where everything we are ends. And I am a master of the flesh, and thus also a master of our truest nature.” 

Reaper listened quietly, but still there was nothing to say or feel. He just stared through his skull at her, passive and bored of her self-satisfied monologue. He didn’t see what any of this had to do with him, or understand why he was being stalled like this. 

Moira paused and observed his silence as sharply as everything else. She seemed to draw her own conclusions of it, then remarked: “Your transformation is not quite complete yet.” 

Reaper wasn’t entirely sure what she meant by that, but he made a disdainful face under the mask. “Shut you, you witch,” he grunted and pushed past her.


	4. iii. Have and hold your husband

It was Athena who woke Jack that night, and who knew how AIs of her calibre made these choices, yet she did. Jack’s personal communication system made a soft boop in the middle of the night, waking up only him. He was disoriented and groggy but recognized the personalized alarm of the device and found it thanks to its buzzing. 

“Yeah?” he rasped when answering. He heard Ana turning on her side across the room, undisturbed. 

“Soldier 76,” Athena’s calm voice addressed him, “there’s an intruder on the grounds of the base.”

Athena’s course of action was so mismatched with the message that Jack was quiet and confused for a moment. “If there’s an intruder, why haven’t you raised the alarm?” he asked. 

“I am raising an alarm, Soldier 76,” Athena replied. “According to my algorithm, you are the best responder to this threat in order to keep the damages at minimum. The intruder is currently in the command centre.” 

Jack could have asked more questions and questioned the AI’s decision making, but suddenly it struck him that there was one obvious and horrifying method in this madness. He didn’t have time to argue with her, so instead he sprung up from his bed, dressed himself in the full gear of Soldier, mask and pulse-rifle included, and ran out of the facility. Everyone else was asleep, and apparently Athena was planning to keep them that way. 

As he was running across the base grounds it occurred to Jack that he might be an ideal responder but also the minimal damage Athena was speaking about, but Jack was not in a habit to concern himself with the ethics of AIs and omnics, so he left it at that. If he was still here in the morning he’d mention about it to Winston, but right now, if what was waiting for him was what he was expecting, that seemed trivial. 

The command centre was dark when Jack stepped inside, and his visor didn’t detect anything out of the usual. All doors were in check as were all the equipment piled into there. It was dead quiet there as well, not a sound to be heard, and so Jack pressed himself near the floor, readied his rifle and carefully advanced forward. 

The ground floor was empty as he crouched in the corner to observe it, and there was no other choice than to try and make his way upstairs. Athena had spotted someone here, and Jack was certain that she would have notified him if the grounds were empty. The intruder had to be still here, and Athena was choosing to stay out of this, and so Jack had no choice but to make his way to the dangerously exposed stairs that led up to the catwalks and the actual computer centre. He advanced against the wall while keeping his eye on as large an amount of the facility as possible, careful not to make a single sound, and when he finally managed to get far enough to reach the bottom of the stairs he saw a faint light from computer screen lit upstairs. Naturally. 

As soundlessly as possibly Jack rose the stairs, one step at the time and with his gaze focused on the pale eerie glow from the command centre, and step by step in the back of his mind he was more and more certain of what was expecting him there. 

No one bothered him as he walked the steps, but still his body tingled with a sensed danger that was waiting for him somewhere, and he had a feeling he had been detected a while ago. His hold on the pulse-rifle tightened and he took the safety off. 

The catwalk was empty and when Jack stepped there nothing happened. He stood still again for a moment, observing and perhaps expecting something, but nothing came. The facility was as dead quiet as a moment ago, just the flickering glow from the command centre showing any signs of life. 

Jack braced himself, crouched again a bit and rose to the tips of his feet, ready to bounce. His muscles wound up like a string, and after a deep breath of air he sprung forward, leaping to the door of the command centre with his rifle locked and loaded and ready for action. 

“Stay where you are!” he barked for whoever was in the room, his rifle searching for a target.

There was one man in the room, and he didn’t do anything as Jack charged in. There was a familiar silhouette, clad in black and like a shadow in the eerie light of the screens, and he didn’t even turn to look at Jack or his gun. 

Reaper was languidly leaning on the desk, there was a device of some sort hooked into the computer system and the top secret files of the Overwatch agents were flicking on one of the screens. 

“Hello, Soldier 76,” Reaper greeted him coldly without turning to him. “I see they sent the elite cavalry this time.” 

Jack inched his way into the room, rifle ready and took in the situation quickly. Talon operative after their employee list was nothing new, but the way Reaper was presenting himself was. Winston had told him about the previous attack, and sending just one man to for a re-do seemed odd. 

“You and I both know I won’t let you leave with those files,” Jack said, slowly making his way behind Reaper. 

“Just like you and I both know that I will do so anyway,” Reaper said. 

“Over my dead body.”

“That’s the idea.” 

Jack fixed his hold on his rifle. The heavy weapon pressed against his chest like the obvious solution that it was, and he flexed his fingers on its frame. He finally made his way directly behind Reaper and there he stilled, taking aim directly in the middle of his back. If he shot there, the bullet spray would tear out his heart and lungs. The ideal goal. 

“Step away from the desk or I will shoot,” Jack ordered. 

Reaper gave a cold laugh. “As if you wouldn’t shoot in any case. Or as if _I_ wouldn’t shoot in any case,” he chuckled, his back to him and unmoving. “One of us will die tonight, Soldier. That seems inevitable.” 

“Is that why you’re here?” Jack asked. He flexed his fingers again. He didn’t want to get nervous, he didn’t want to be on edge, but this situation didn’t make any sort of tactical sense. 

And it was Reaper. Unrecognizable in every other way except in his voice, it still had a shred of something familiar in it, and it complicated things. Jack fixed his hold on the rifle and kept his aim steady. 

“I am here to extract the names and locations of every and all Overwatch agent for Talon,” Reaper calmly informed him. “And to complete that mission I will do anything that’s necessary.” 

“You knew I’d be here,” Jack spat.

“No, I did not,” Reaper said, “I do not plan these missions and I do not make the decision. I came here to complete an objective. You are an unfortunate hiccup in the way.”

That made even less sense to Jack, but after a second of furious thinking he had to admit to himself that it was the wrong conclusion. For Talon this was just an undermanned base with valuable intel in it, and just because Jack was tracking Reaper didn’t mean that Reaper was tracking him. He was almost disappointed. 

Jack had to avert his tactic. “I knew it would be you. I knew it was you the moment you stepped on these grounds, and you won’t leave here with those names.” 

Finally Reaper moved. He straightened up from the desk, his shoulders relaxed and lazily he turned around to face him. The expressionless skull shone from the surrounding darkness, and Reaper relaxed again against the desk. “Then why haven’t you taken your shot already, Soldier?” 

There was no answer ready, and the almost accusing tone of the observation raised a seed of doubt in Jack: could he shoot? The safety was off, the gun was loaded, he had the aim. All he’d have to do was pull the trigger and all of this would be done. 

Reaper stared at him coldly, and then without a warning and in a movement so quick it left no time to react pulled out one of his shotguns from the holster on his thigh, pointing it at Jack. “Perhaps I will take a shot first.” 

Internally Jack cursed himself, the situation and in an afterthought Athena. The situation was insane. The risk level had already been high but now they were at a stand-off. 

“If you even think about pulling that trigger I will blast helix rockets straight into your face,” Jack growled. 

Reaper let out a mocking laugh. “At this range I will blow a hole the size of a basketball in the middle of your chest. You’re the one who came into a small room with a shotgun.”

“It seems we’re at a difficult point here.” 

“It would seem so indeed.” 

Jack’s gaze flicked to the computer and the device draining vital information out of it. “So let’s talk,” he suggested.

Reaper laughed again, cold and cruel, but also threw a look at the computer. “You have five minutes before I have what I came for. Talk your head off for all I care, after that I will punch a hole in you and leave here.” 

“Sure, whatever,” Jack agreed. “We both want something, and we can… work something out.” It was the standard procedure in negotiations, but here it sounded insane. There were very few things that either of them wanted, and even fewer what could actually be bargained about. And still Jack couldn’t be satisfied with just shooting. It was answers that he wanted, and here was the only person in the world who could give him some. 

Something about the way Reaper tilted his head and peered at him looked like amusement. “You can try, Soldier.” 

Jack thought furiously and yet everything seemed murky. He had been at gunpoint many times before and this was nothing new in his daily life, but somehow he couldn’t pull his thoughts together. Dead men should be freer than this. 

“Look, I don’t know what your deal exactly is, but you don’t have to do this. Talon might want that information, and maybe they’ll get it, but you don’t have to give it to them tonight. You’re just a mercenary after all,” Jack said. 

“That I am, and as such I will do my job,” Reaper replied. “There’s nothing stopping me as I am fairly sure I will be the better shot between the two of us.” 

“You will not leave here with those names,” Jack repeated.

Reaper huffed in dismissal. “Or I will, you just won’t live to see it.” 

Jack tried to think. Was Reaper really here according to his own plans or had he been ordered? He seemed to focus on the claim that he had been ordered, but that seemed like such a stupid thing to do. Unless… Unless Talon knew that Jack and Ana had arrived here as well, in which case this would be a perfect dead-end scenario with a win-win outcome for someone who could do without either or both of them.

Or a loyalty test. That would be another option worthy of consideration, Jack thought. Destroy the last tie to your previous life and give yourself fully over to your new one. A classic move of cults and other such organizations that ran on blind loyalty. And judging by the languid, self-assured way Reaper was presenting himself and how steady his hold of his shotgun was, Jack was dangerously close to become the collateral damage of that loyalty test, no matter how much trust Athena had put in him.

“It really doesn’t have to be like this, there are always options,” Jack said.

This time Reaper actually laughed at his words. “Options! What options? You know as well as I do that it doesn’t work like that, your options are dreams and delusions! Besides, this must be the worst negotiation I’ve ever witnessed. These tricks won’t work on me, I know all of them as well as you do, remember?” 

Jack knew that, he was painfully aware of it, and having it pointed out with such open mockery was almost enough to make him feel embarrassed. He would have been, only if the notion didn’t also draw painful attention to the man behind Reaper’s mask. 

“Yeah, you know all of that, because you used to work here. This is your life’s work too, those agents were your responsibility once, and I know what you gave for this organization,” Jack said. “And if you want to shoot at them, then let it be so, but you don’t have to go after those. Those whose info you’re downloading are civilians. They are not your targets.” 

“Don’t talk to me about my life,” Reaper spat with a sudden bitter streak in his voice. There was a slight strain in his posture then, but he quickly shook it off. “You are all legitimate targets. Getting rid of Overwatch was the best thing that happened to this world in decades, and we will finish the job. There’s nothing here that I want more than those names, and your pathetic attempts to distract me won’t work.” 

“And still we’re talking. Let’s just… keep doing that,” Jack said, struggling to stay in the role of the negotiator, one that was already contradicted by him holding a gun and having a lock at the person he was supposed to persuade. 

“Three minutes,” Reaper reminded him softly, and Jack didn’t need to see his face to know that there was an ironic smile on it.

His face. Jack tried to shake the image from his mind. He was doing his hardest to keep Reaper and the man under that mask apart, but it was proving to be impossible. Whatever had piled between them – pain, time, masks, names – they were not enough to alter reality. Reality that was currently staring at Jack through eye holes in a blank skullmask. 

“Reyes,” Jack said even though the name felt like a swear word here, “you’re not like this. You’re not some… puppet mercenary who’ll jump through hoops at a simple command!”

“Shut the hell up,” Reaper snapped, “that man is no more. There’s no use for you to yap on about him and what he used to be.”

Jack grew frustrated. He felt his palms sweating inside the gloves, and he shuffled on his feet, trying to get a better footing. “No, that’s what you are! Your past doesn’t just suddenly stop mattering! Reyes, they can’t force you to do anything. You don’t have to do this, there can be other ways, any other way for this to resolve, whatever you want – “

“And maybe I want to kill you, Soldier,” Reaper rushed to interrupt, “maybe that’s what I really want! Maybe _I_ know what I want and who I am, and maybe you’re the one living out your own pathetic fantasy about rescuing someone who’s already gone!” 

_Gone_ hurt like a bullet to the chest, and Jack realized he flinched at it. Partially it hurt so much because he couldn’t be entirely sure which one of them was actually correct. Which part of the loss was actually the permanent one? What was gone forever? Jack had tried to live as if he had actually laid his previous life in that graveyard back in the States, but pretending was all he had accomplished. His hold on the situation was slipping. Time was running out and he should have just pulled the trigger. 

“We’re here now,” Jack insisted. “Our pasts have brought us to this present. And even though we are pointing our damn guns at each other, you can’t pretend like we are some other people just because we’ve come so far.” He felt like a hypocrite, talking like that. And still he kept going. “Reyes. I know it’s you, we both know it.”

“No, you think you know,” Reaper insisted. He was agitated, but there was a strong current of loathing in his tone now. His shotgun was steadily pointed at Jack’s chest. “I don’t know what nonsense you’re trying to pull, but death has the power the end things. No one in the human kind even pretends that they can avoid it. Even promises and vows are only sworn until death. You can run your mouth all you want, but you won’t bring anything back from the dead.” 

“We are not dead,” Jack insisted, his voice harsh and struggling. “We’re alive. We’re still _here_! And we can’t be hidden forever.”

Reaper spat again. “We are both _dead_! Everything that was is now in those graves. I know you’ve visited them. Everything in our previous lives has been buries six feet under.”

“And yet… Here we are. You and I.” It was too close to something real for Jack’s comfort, and he was suddenly too aware of his gear. His visor felt awkward and so did every other bit of his gear. He was about to curse himself with his own words, to destroy his own carefully crafted persona for nothing. “Those graves are nothing more than pits and rocks, Reyes.” 

“Believe what you want, it won’t change anything.”

“Yeah… It won’t,” Jack admitted. “Your denial won’t either.”

“If your time wasn’t already almost up I would shoot you just for your idiocy.” 

Jack stood steadfast. He switched tracks again, still pressuring: “Reyes, it’s me, Morrison. You know me. I know you know me, you recognized me so easily, you said it yourself. You know me so well that you were expecting me.”

“Shut up. I know your name. It means nothing, Soldier.” 

Jack almost couldn’t hear the capital letter in the word Reaper addressed him. Right now he was pulling himself out of his own persona as well, and it was already feeling more distant than it had in years. “Yeah, you know my name, because somewhere deep down we are still those same people. If you know my name, you know yours too.”

“Your pathetic attempt at mind games means nothing to me. And it will definitely not save you.”

Jack felt the air tensing. The download was almost completed, and his hold of his rifle became almost painfully tight. “Yeah, maybe. Maybe we’ll both go out in a blaze of glory.”

“You can’t shoot me,” Reaper said, self-assured and calm.

And Jack knew it to be true too. He should have just pulled the trigger, but he couldn’t do that any more than he could suddenly learn how to fly. But there lay the key to this whole thing. “And why is that?” he asked quietly.

Reaper was quiet for a bit too long. “Because…” he started but halted, silent again.

“Because… what?” Jack pressed on, forcing them both to that one thought, that damning seed of truth trying to bloom between them.

“You know why!” Reaper snapped, almost yelled, completely forgetting about his indifferent and cool persona.

A flame was lit inside Jack, and he fuelled it, yelling back: “Then say it! Why can’t I shoot you!?” 

“Because you love me! Because under that ugly, stupid mask you are still Jack Morrison and you love me!” Reaper sneered back at him, yelled it like it was torn out of him and every word hurt like a mouthful of needles. His hold on the weapon trembled, and it looked like he was clutching it like a lifeline. 

“That I do,” Jack sighed as if admitting defeat, and yet he felt anything but. “I do. Because you are my Gabe, and I could never hurt you. Do you hear that? Gabe. That’s who you are, under that dumb façade. My Gabe.”

Reaper groaned in a harsh, suffering voice. The hand holding the weapon trembled, trembled some more, and then slumped. He let out a pained moan. “Jackie,” he whispered, “Jackie. Jackie, Jackie…” 

“Yeah,” Jack answered, the rifle falling to his side. He hadn’t heard that name in eight years. “That’s me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go then, once again a long-fic has ended. I really like this ending here, and I was so satisfied to finally get there after writing for four hours straight like a seal slapping at a keyboard. (Seriously, this entire last chapter was one ride for me.)
> 
> Dear reader, thank you so much for reading until the end! I hope you liked this work! If you did, leave kudos, and all sorts of comments are welcome as well. I'm always eager to know what you thought of my work.


End file.
